CHAPTER NINETEEN
Cruella heard the Dearlys’ voices and ran upstairs. This time she was wearing a black satin dress with ropes of pearls, but the same absolutely simple white mink cloak. She had kept it round her all through dinner, although the room was very warm (and the pepper very hot).
Dodie Smith, The Hundred and One Dalmatians
They did get wet. Forty minutes later, they made it back to the rickety stable yard, soaked through and exhausted from having run down the uneven hillside, but all of them shrieking wildly.
At first, no one noticed the Mercedes parked on the gravel at the front of the house, but as he came back out of Goose’s dark stable with the tack, Kestel spotted the silver car.
Sage watched as his spark seemed to extinguish before her eyes.
Kestrel’s gaze became glassy and his body sagged against the wall.
He seemed unaware of the deluge hammering down on his drenched body and the baskets lay on the sodden ground where he had dropped them by his feet.
‘Kestrel, what on earth is the matter?’ Sage asked, putting her hand on his arm in concern.
‘My sister, Mary.’ He spoke so quietly that she had to lean in to hear him. He pointed towards the car and her eyes followed.
‘And that’s a problem, I assume. Are you sure it’s her?’
He heaved a sigh. ‘Yes, it’s definitely her car.’
Sage peeled Kestrel off the wall, linked an arm through his and slowly drew him over to the house.
Hal followed behind, gallantly dragging the trailing bridle and baskets that he had managed to pick up and now clasped in his small arms. They trudged up the steps to the front door and entered the cool, dry hall.
Kestrel stood in a stupor, watching a puddle of water pooling on the stone floor beneath his boots.
‘When was the last time you saw your sister, Kestrel?’ Sage asked in a hushed tone.
‘I … I’m not sure.’ His glazed expression cleared slightly and he focused instead on Sage, taking a moment to organize his thoughts.
‘I haven’t seen her since my father’s funeral,’ he continued in a sad whisper.
‘Mary swooped in to pillage the castle of any leftover treasures. There weren’t many – poor Papa had been hocking them for years in the hope of saving the place.
Mary took all the remaining valuable paintings along with the family tiara and jewels, then hotfooted it back to our house in Belgravia.
I wanted to sell the London house in order to save Castle Dunbarton, but she blocked that and has commandeered the whole place.
That’s where she lives now.’ Kestrel wiped his hands over his face.
‘Perhaps she just wanted to check on you?’
‘I doubt it. We’d better go and find her before she starts rifling through the silver,’ he added bitterly.
Sage couldn’t fathom such a lack of familial love. She was thanking God, silently, for Casper’s endless and unconditional support, when a pair of high heels sounded on the flagstones along the passage.
‘Oh, there you are.’ Lady Mary Dunbarton rounded the corner.
She was thin and toweringly tall on high black stilettos, and her blonde hair sat in a severe bob just below her chin.
Sage immediately felt intimidated by her tailored clothes and the tight-lipped expression on her angular, immaculately made-up face.
Mary was not beautiful; her waxy features were rather immobile and she had unfortunately small teeth, but the overall impression was of a pampered creature who spent her life being massaged and blow-dried into something sophisticated.
She looked strangely familiar, although Sage could not place why.
What a contrast to her brother though, she thought in disbelief, affectionately regarding Kestrel as he stood trying to take up the least possible amount of space, stooping his long frame in the hall, his bedraggled, dripping tweeds making a striking contrast next to the brittle, severe lines of Mary’s expensive black clothes.
‘Mrs M says you’re Rafe’s friend,’ Mary pronounced savagely. Her beady eyes ran over Sage, taking in her wild, rose-cheeked prettiness. ‘What’s your name again? I seem to have forgotten it already.’
‘Yes – hi, I’m Sage Deverill. Beaumont, I mean.’ Sage faltered; she was still adjusting to being able to use her maiden name again. She suddenly felt ridiculous and cumbersome in her muddy, sopping clothes beside this sleek, elegant woman.
Mary gave Hal a dismissive look and returned to Kestrel.
‘Have you been drinking already this morning? It’s early even for you, Kestrel. I need to speak to you, alone.’ She gave a disparaging sniff, turned on her heel and clattered back into the kitchen.
Kestrel shot Sage a look of pure misery, then followed his sister with drooping shoulders. Sage took Hal’s hand and bolted up the staircase in order to run a hot bath and change into dry clothes.
That afternoon Sage was reading to Hal, who was dozing on the bed beside her, when there was a tentative knock on the door.
‘Sage – can I come in?’ came a hiss from the landing outside. She got up and opened the door to find Kestrel looking meek, holding a tray.
‘Come in, Kestrel. Are you OK?’ She ushered him inside, but not before casting about a furtive glance to check they were not being watched.
‘Thank you. Yes, I’m all right. It was just a bit of a shock to find that bitch –’ Sage was surprised to hear real venom on gentle Kestrel’s tongue – ‘in my house.’ He hesitated, then gave a slightly forced smile.
‘Here, I brought you up some tea and biscuits.’ Sage took them, touched by his thoughtful gesture.
It felt like a long time since the sandwiches on the hill and she was hungry.
Kestrel looked weary and somehow much older than he had that morning. ‘I wanted to come and explain a few things,’ he continued. He cleared his throat awkwardly and sat down on a little chair in the corner of the room. ‘I’m pretty sure that my darling sister is up here to investigate you.’
‘Me?’ Sage said, aghast. ‘Why?’
Kestrel drew in a deep breath.
‘Mary has always been obsessed with Rafe, ever since we were children. Of course, anyone who meets Rafe becomes immediately besotted with him – you of all people must have noticed.’ Sage nodded, conceding that she had.
‘Well, poor Rafe has been brushing off Mary’s unsolicited advances since he was about fifteen. ’
‘But – you’re cousins.’ Sage put down her cup of tea and rested her head in her hands, a new wave of emotional exhaustion lapping at her. Kestrel gave a hard little laugh.
‘Second cousins, although that has never stood in the way of the aristocracy, my dear. Everyone is related. They are all so worried about losing titles and wealth that they operate in the same tiny circles, terrified of diluting the blood – or the dough. In the end, it all trickles away regardless and the children often bear the brunt of it, ending up mad or bad. Rafe, God bless him, has never given a stuff about all that material nonsense, despite the hundreds of bright young things that line up for him. No, he has waited it out to find you – the absolutely right person. I am afraid my bloody sister will be utterly poisonous to you though. She had some flimsy excuse about turning up, but none of it rings true. Her jealousy is a terrible thing to behold. All I can do to protect you is forewarn you I’m afraid, for alas, I am no match for Mary.
’ Kestrel looked desolate, absently-mindedly picking at a hole in the knee of his trousers.
‘Well, Mary can relax because I think Rafe and I might be in trouble,’ Sage said, wringing her hands together in profound sorrow.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I cannot believe that,’ Kestrel said immediately. He listened patiently as Sage told him the whole, sorry situation.
‘Please don’t tell anyone,’ she finished. ‘My brother could lose everything.’
‘I won’t, but I think you underestimate my cousin, Sage.
He’s made of sterner stuff than you give him credit for.
’ He shook his head. ‘When Rafe was about fourteen, he and his family came to stay at Castle Dunbarton one Christmas. He and my father were very close. I rather think Papa wished that Rafe had been his heir, not me. I was never very good at hunting, shooting or fishing. I tried so hard to be a good Little Lord and learn the ropes, though. I endlessly swotted up on how to run the estate but my father, God rest his soul, was likewise not a natural overlord and in the end, there was nothing left to inherit after the horrendously debilitating death duties we had to pay when he died. I digress – forgive me. Rafe is a true-born alpha male. I mean, he managed to complete the Macnab Junior Challenge when he was nine years old, for heaven’s sake!
’ Kestrel looked at Sage for a reaction, expecting her to be impressed.
‘I don’t know what that means,’ she confessed.
‘Well, it’s nothing short of extraordinary.
I find myself off on another tangent, however.
So, Rafe was with us for Christmas, and it was bitter that year, with three feet of snow piled up everywhere.
Anyway, he realized that my father had been feeling a bit low, so he bicycled down to the village on Christmas Eve to get him a Crunchie bar, Papa’s absolute favourite.
He cycled three miles in the snow, on a treacherous road down the hill and then all the way back up again, just to procure a chocolate bar for my father. ’
Sage looked back at him searchingly, struggling to keep pace with his scatter-gun thoughts.
‘My point is that if Rafe loves someone, he will move heaven and earth just to make them happy. Don’t give up on him, Sage – he won’t give up on you, I’m certain of it. He would never have sent you to me if he didn’t love you or wasn’t certain that you loved him in return.’
Sage thought for a while. Through the window, the melancholic loch mirrored the dank, grey sky. The rain was still hammering down, making the surface of the water rough and fragmented.