Chapter Four
Marianne Calthorpe, Duchess of Thistlewayte, had just stepped out of her bedroom, intent on joining her family at the breakfast table, when Charlotte — Eugenia’s lady’s maid — rushed up the hall to meet her. Charlotte curtsied, then spoke in a rush.
“It’s Lady Eugenia, Your Grace. I fear she is ill.
When I went to rouse her and ready her for the day just now, I could not wake her.
” A tendril of dark, wavy brown hair which, in her hurry to fetch the Duchess, had come loose from Charlotte’s bun, fell in front of the maid’s eyes and she batted it away, continuing her explanation.
“She is feverish, murmuring deliriously in her sleep, and her hair is damp with sweat. I believe you should send for the Physician.”
Charlotte curtsied again, her green eyes wide and fearful, her pale face bunched with a fierce frown of concern. The Duchess snapped to attention, a knot of concern sitting heavy in her stomach. She loathed the thought of any of her children suffering any sort of pain or illness.
“Get one of the footmen and have him go for the physician at once.”
Breakfast forgotten, as the maid scurried away, the Duchess rushed to her eldest daughter’s room, needing to see Eugenia’s condition for herself.
She had always been a doting mother, and more directly involved with her children than was considered fashionable, but she did not care.
She loved her children passionately, and cared equally for the wellbeing of each of the ten of them.
With a cursory knock, she let herself into Eugenia’s bedroom, and her heart clenched at the sight of her daughter.
Her damp golden hair clung to her head and her usually pale face was quite red in the cheeks as she tossed fitfully, mumbling some sort of incoherent soliloquy which must have been prompted by whatever she was dreaming about.
The Duchess sat down on the edge of the bed, right beside Eugenia, and gently stroked her daughter’s feverish brow with a cool, soothing hand.
“I have sent for the Physician, my darling girl. Do not worry. We will have you well again in no time at all.”
Completely unaware of her mother’s presence, Eugenia continued her incoherent mumbling, occasionally interspersed with whimpers that tugged at her mother’s heartstrings. As she waited for Charlotte to return and the Physician to arrive, the Duchess noticed something strange.
Just a couple of steps away from her, there was a patch of dirt and grass on the soft rug which covered the polished wood of the floor.
“I wonder…”
The Duchess murmured, her gaze flicking to where Eugenia’s feet were tucked under the covers.
An idea bloomed, then, and she rose, lifted the covers away from Eugenia’s feet, and checked them.
As she had suspected they would be, Eugenia’s feet were dirty, as if she’d been wandering barefoot in the garden.
She’s started sleepwalking again, the Duchess realised.
My poor girl. Upsetting situations have always disturbed her so much more deeply than they do the others.
She feels so much, so deeply, and it affects both her health and her safety.
It is astonishing that she somehow manages to get down the stairs without falling and hurting herself.
Shaking her head, the Duchess clicked her tongue and sighed, just as Charlotte let herself into Eugenia’s bedroom.
“Boswell has gone to fetch the Physician for you, Your Grace. What can I do to be of help?”
“We should wash her face and try to cool it down, I think. She feels a little feverish.”
“Of course, Your Grace.”
Charlotte curtsied and went to retrieve some washcloths and a fresh bowl of cool water.
As soon as the bedroom door closed behind the lady’s maid, the Duchess stood and pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket.
Striding over to the pitcher and basin on the far side of the room, she dampened the kerchief, wrung the excess water out of it, and hurried back over to the bed to clean Eugenia’s feet.
She would, of course, mention the sleepwalking to the Physician, as it was most likely — at least in part — to blame for Eugenia’s illness, but that did not mean that she had to let her daughter sully the bedclothes with her dirty feet.
Besides that, the Duchess did her best to dust off the bedclothes because she abhorred dirt, and could not think of anything more horrid than rousing to consciousness in a dirty bed after suffering with a fever, and she wouldn’t have Eugenia suffer that fate if she could help it.
When she was finished, she crossed the room again and left the dirty handkerchief beside the pitcher and basin where Charlotte would be sure to see it and know that it needed washing.
Then, the Duchess perched once again on the edge of the bed and stroked Eugenia’s hair, murmuring soothing nothings to her daughter in an attempt to calm her fitful sleep.
Charlotte soon returned with more water and washcloths that they could use to cool Eugenia’s face, and the Duchess motioned the lady’s maid to the other side of the bed, so they could each reach and tend to Eugenia.
The Duchess was still sitting in that very same spot, bathing her daughter’s face with a cool, damp washcloth, when the Physician arrived.
The man bustled into the room, and with one look towards the bed became all business. He brushed the maid aside, sending her for more cool water, even as he bent over lady Eugenia’s fevered brow.
“Thank you for coming so quickly. She appears feverish, and I suspect that it was caused at least in part, by her sleepwalking again – as you may remember she did when she was quite young. I think that she went out into the gardens in the damp air of dawn…”
“Your Grace, I believe that you are correct. Care will be needed, to prevent that from happening again – but as to the fever, I am sure that, if you continue as you have begun, with keeping her skin dry and cooled, whilst not letting her become too cold, all will be well. The fever may take some days to break, but she is a strong and resilient young woman.”
The Duchess gave a sigh of relief at his words.
“Then I shall persist, I will not let harm come to my daughter! Someone will be with her always, at all hours of the night and day, so that we can prevent any further sleepwalking.”
They spoke for another few minutes, and the Physician gave further instructions, eventually departing after promising to return in two days’ time, unless sent for earlier than that.
ASHEWOOD HALL
“I beg your pardon, My Lord, but are you saying that the fire at the gatehouse was set on purpose?”
Mr. Morgan, who had long been the steward of the Ashewood estate, frowned fiercely, even as he paled at the notion.
“Yes.” Marco nodded grimly, rapping on the dark wood surface of his desk with his knuckles for emphasis.
“That is exactly what I’m saying, Morgan.
Someone threw a torch through the sitting room window.
It’s just lucky it was on the far side of the gatehouse from Stanley, and the sound of the glass shattering woke him.
As it is, he barely managed to make it out alive. It’s a terrible incident, to be sure.”
“Do we have any idea why someone would do such a thing, Lord D’Asti?”
Morgan leaned forward, resting his forearms on the desk and giving Marco his full, undivided attention.
“Yes, we have a clue, at least, but I do not wish it to become common knowledge just yet, so what I am about to tell you is just between us until we know more about who torched the gatehouse and why.” Marco paused, pulling the threatening letter out of his jacket pocket.
He unfolded it and slid it across the green felt blotter on his desk so that Morgan could see it for himself.
“I returned here from London because I received an anonymous threat from someone saying that they would burn Ashewood to the ground if I did not return here immediately. I’m not certain what their motivation is.
It could be that they wanted to bring me back here for a reason, possibly to address something, but I do not yet know who they are or what grievance they are levying against me.
It could also be that someone simply wanted me out of London for the time being, but I do not know why that would be, either.
Until we know more about who is doing this and what their motivations are, I do not wish the rest of the staff or the other local residents to know that I came here expressly because Ashewood was being threatened, you see. ”
“I understand, my Lord.”
Morgan nodded his agreement, stroking his greying beard thoughtfully as he took in the information Marco had shared with him.
“For now, I would like to focus on doing whatever we need to do to rebuild the gatehouse and uncover who is behind the threat, and what they want from me. Also, see that Stanley is well taken care of here in the main house in the meantime. He was quite shaken up, and feeling the loss of his wife all over again, after losing everything they owned. It was all in the gatehouse and lost in the fire.”
“Of course. We will take the absolute best care of Mr. Stanley. I agree that yours is a good plan of action, my Lord.” Morgan paused and cleared his throat, his gaze wandering around the room, landing on anything but Marco as he continued.
“Not to be indelicate, my Lord, but how are we to pay for the materials and labour needed to rebuild the gatehouse?”
Marco winced and bit his lip, mulling that question over for a moment.
“I suppose I shall have to send word to the family man-of-business to sell another of the pieces of art remaining in my family’s collection, though I hate to do it. That is my best option at this point.”
“I’m sorry the loss of the art pains you, my Lord.”
Marco slumped a little lower in his chair, feeling the responsibility he held to all of the people his estates supported like a weight crushing him.
It was an honour to have people to care for, of course, and he did not resent them.
Rather, he lamented that he was doing so poorly by them, when he desperately wanted to save them all and see them prosper.
“A gentleman does what he must, Morgan. I just wish that the threat to Ashewood had not come at such a terribly inopportune time. I was, when the threat was delivered to me at Lady Duncan’s Ball, busy courting a young lady — one whom I could easily love and truly hope to have the privilege of spending my life with — who also happens to have a dowry which would solve all of our monetary problems.”
The steward leaned forward then, drumming his fingers on the desktop with an intelligent gleam in his stormy grey eyes.
“This may not be a comforting thought, my Lord, but I feel compelled to voice it. Perhaps the object of the threat was to separate you from the young lady you were courting? It could be a rival suitor trying to remove you from his path. Or there may be another reason, which is not yet known to us, that someone wanted you here at Ashewood, rather than in London.”
Frowning, Marco nodded in response to his steward’s observations.
“What you say makes good sense. I just wish that I knew who is making these threats, and why they’re doing it.
If I just had some knowledge of their motivations, I might be able to resolve the situation and return to courting my sweet little English lily before some other suitor manages to steal her heart right out from under me.
I do not think that I could bear it if that happened. ”
Morgan was watching him, obviously considering what had been said.
Marco’s chest constricted painfully at the thought of possibly having to marry someone besides Lady Eugenia, in order to save his estates and the people who relied on them, and Marco rubbed a hand against his breastbone in an attempt to soothe the dull, empty ache which bloomed there at the thought of a life without her.
The possibility was both terrifying and very real, though he hated that he had to consider it at all.
Morgan, who was both sharp-witted and highly competent at his job, missed nothing. He pointed at the spot where Marco was rubbing his aching chest and arched a brow at the Count.
“Then we shall just have to do our best to find out who is following through on the threats, and discover whether there is a way to make it stop, so that you can return to your courtship before we fall on any harder times, my Lord.”
Marco nodded and stood, forcing himself to stop rubbing his chest. He let his hand fall to his side and paced over to the study’s window, gazing down at the garden and the hunting park beyond it.
“Quite right, Morgan. Well, let’s see to getting Mr. Stanley moved into the main house until the gatehouse is fixed, shall we?”
“Absolutely, my Lord.”
Morgan bowed, then strode out of Marco’s study to see to getting Stanley settled in, leaving Marco to think.
Who was doing this to him?
Who would be willing to burn this estate to the ground to get to him?
Was it his debtors?
A rival suitor?
An angry local, unhappy with the hardships that Ashewood Village was very likely facing due to the debts which Marco needed to pay off?
Or someone else entirely?
And, no matter who it was, what were their motivations?
Marco sighed, shaking his head. He had absolutely no idea, but knew that he had better work it out sooner rather than later, before his chances with Lady Eugenia disappeared completely.