Chapter 11
Eleven
If you have the opportunity to meet a ghost, pay attention to her accessories.
Godric rose more slowly, his face stubbornly unimpressed.
“Mon dieu,” Colette cried, one hand on her heart, the other pointing toward the bookshelves. “I saw a shroud!”
“I saw a slipper,” I said, heading in that direction.
(I didn’t say it aloud, but that was an awfully familiar slipper. Perhaps one of Burnsby’s former wives shared my taste?)
“Ghosts wear slippers?” Colette caught up to me. “Well, why not? Why should we be unshod in the afterworld? I hope to wear my favorite shoes with clusters of emeralds on the toes.”
“These were plain,” I said. “No heels.”
“I require heels,” Colette declared. “It’s bad enough that one has to dash around in a sheet.”
I walked into the alcove where I had found Ophelia reading earlier that day—and into which the ghost had disappeared. “Ophelia?” I peeked behind her chair.
Colette raised an eyebrow. “So it’s like that, is it?”
I turned to Godric. “Surely you know how to access the passage?”
“Naturally, there’s a secret passage,” Colette muttered to herself. “Quel imbécile! How could I have not thought of it? I’ve read all the books.”
Godric obligingly walked to the back wall, where an alcove held a heavy leather-bound book. “Dante’s Inferno.” He picked it up.
A narrow door swung silently open to reveal a dark hallway.
“I shan’t enter,” Colette said, peering inside. “My maid would be enraged if I soiled my hem. Where does it lead?”
“To the second garden,” Godric said.
“Where are the other passages?” I asked.
“We know of three. This one from the garden to the library; another from the kitchen to the corridor outside the dining room, allowing delivery of hot food; and a third from the servants’ quarters to the kitchen.
A lost passage is rumored to have led from the sanctuary to an unknown location.
It would have been useful for the monks but no one else, likely why its location has been forgotten. ”
I turned to Colette. “We should search the chapel, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely,” she responded, eyes glowing. “The passage may contain the bones of a monk who lost hope of rescue.”
Godric poked his head into the passage and bellowed, “Ophelia!”
Footsteps pattered in the darkness, and Lancelot appeared, his half-sister close behind. After they walked into the room, Godric dropped the Inferno back into place, and the door swung shut.
“How did I do?” Ophelia asked excitedly. “I heard a terrific scream.” She was wearing a white hooded cloak edged with snowy fur.
“That was me,” Colette said, leaning against her husband as he wrapped an arm around her and kissed her forehead. “Genevieve was frightfully brave and didn’t even squeak.”
“I recognized my slippers,” I admitted. “Have you played a ghostly role to ensure privacy in the library, Ophelia?”
She nodded. “The nursery is freezing in December, so I often wear my mother’s cloak to stay warm because it’s lined in fox. My father won’t allow me to be in the library while he’s in residence, but a few years ago he caught sight of me here and ran away. Later I scared Alice, without meaning to.”
“Thus, a legend was born.” Godric smiled at Ophelia, which changed his entire face. His cheekbones . . .
Anyway.
“When Burnsby encountered you here, did he offer to ease your passage into the underworld?” I asked with some curiosity.
“What? No,” Ophelia said. “He squawked like a chicken and fled. The one thing I’m sorry about is that maids won’t enter the room. Footmen set the fires, and Miss Wellington has to do the rest.”
“Colette’s maid and mine have volunteered to dust the books, the better to prove the courage of their respective nations,” I said. “Perhaps you might join them, Ophelia, standing for brave Scotswomen.”
“That’s fair,” she agreed.
We returned to the couches before the fire, Lance drawing his wife down beside him.
“What shall we report tomorrow morning? What did we see?” Colette asked, tapping her chin with a finger.
“We saw nothing,” I decreed. “Even Burnsby would smell a rat if Ophelia left the table and a ghost immediately appeared. What excuse did you two offer for leaving before the sweets course?”
“I’m afraid that my dear papa took the opportunity to air his feelings regarding my choice of bride,” Lance said, his arm tight around Colette. “I warned you, didn’t I, darling?”
“You did,” Colette said. “Was he dreadful?”
“Yes,” Ophelia said bluntly.
“Surprisingly theatrical,” Lance said. “Calling on the spirits of our ancestors, talking of my mother’s dishonor, threatening to disinherit me.”
“He can’t disinherit you,” Godric remarked. “The laws of primogeniture guard against bigotry. That’s not legal grounds for disruption of an entailed inheritance.”
“I’m not surprised to hear of my husband’s intolerance, but I am deeply apologetic,” I said, turning to Colette.
“No need,” she said lightly. “I wouldn’t have cared to be part of Lance’s revenge if he had kept it from me, but he divulged everything before he asked for my hand. My husband loves me no matter the color of my skin.”
Lance’s smile was achingly adoring. “Your skin, like the whole of you, is exquisite.”
“I suppose you informed your father of the error of his ways?” Godric asked.
“They began shouting,” Ophelia reported.
“A spirited discussion ensued,” Lance said. “Burnsby called on the gods of propriety and rectitude; I retorted with an unkind reference to Sophonisba; he invoked my mother, which was a low blow, since I never knew her.”
“Did you steal away?” I asked Ophelia.
“Mima did, but I was waiting for Lance to resort to Shakespeare,” Ophelia said. “I would have used Shylock’s ‘If you prick us, do we not bleed?’ from The Merchant of Venice.”
“I was too angry for literary references,” Lance said. He kissed his wife’s forehead. “I was literally seeing red. I knew our marriage would infuriate my father, but I had no idea how enraged I would become. I lost all composure.”
“You had imagined yourself making suave rejoinders?” Godric asked, amused.
“I came close to knocking a septuagenarian from his chair,” Lance confessed. “Instead, I informed him that he’d never see either of us after this visit and left. Unfortunately the snow has prevented a dramatic exit from the abbey.”
“I ran after him,” Ophelia said. “Lance was feeling rather gloomy, so I suggested we venture into the passage and try to scare all of you.”
Godric gave Lance one of those manly pats that gentlemen exchange. “Well done.”
“In marriage or life?” Lance asked, his mouth forming a crooked smile.
Godric turned to Colette, picked up her hand, and kissed it. “In marriage and life.”
“We could take our meals in the library from now on,” I offered. “You needn’t face Burnsby again.”
“I don’t mind,” Colette said jauntily.
“There’s my brave wife,” Lance said. His eyes narrowed. “I have a mind to ruin my father’s birthday celebration with our presence. I shall toast you at length as the mother of future Burnsbys.”
“Very well, dear,” Colette said, with the air of a wife allowing her husband a foolish treat.
“Are you sure you won’t mind?” I asked, searching her eyes.
“French society is far more accepting than English, but I have weathered my share of unkind remarks.” She shrugged. “My mother was rich and beautiful, and so am I, which meant we were both lucky enough to marry the gentlemen whom we chose. For a lady, that is the greatest gift life can bestow.”
She leaned forward and kissed my cheek in a silent acknowledgment that I hadn’t been as lucky.
“Shall we retire to the breakfast room?” Lance asked. “I directed Crumpsall to set up tea and toast.”
“Fabulous!” Ophelia cried, jumping up and dashing over to the door.
I rose and shook out my skirts.
As Lance helped Colette to her feet, he muttered something in her ear. She crowed with laughter. “Darling Genevieve, my husband thinks you are even more delectable without all that lace around your neck.”
I felt myself turning pink and instinctively glanced down at my modest cleavage.
Godric’s face darkened, and he glared at his friend before he picked up my lace cravat and draped it so it covered my front.
Lancelot winked at him before he turned to me. “Please don’t be offended, stepmama. I meant that as a private compliment, but my wife has never heard a secret she didn’t want to share.”
Colette elbowed him. “Genevieve has had enough of your private assessments. I heard about those insults.”
“None of them true,” Godric said again.
I glanced up at him as he put a hand on the middle of my back. His touch burned through the fabric of my gown as we walked to the door to join Ophelia. “That’s kind of you,” I said, sounding uncertain even to my ears.
He was kind.
“Though you were an idiot to have married Burnsby,” he added.
I took it back; he wasn’t kind. I scowled at him. “No one has been idiotic enough to marry you.”
“I haven’t been searching in the right places,” he said.
“I can help you,” I said, a bit flustered by the intensity of his gaze. “I shouldn’t have implied that you need to take out an advertisement. I can find you a lovely woman to marry.”
“Aren’t you kind?” Colette said, gurgling with laughter.
“I have no interest in taking a wife at the moment,” Godric said, shooting her a reproving glance.
“Why on earth not?” she asked, her tone very innocent. “How old are you? Some women prefer older men.”
“He is not too old,” I said.
“I’m nearing thirty,” Godric said, “but I have an important case coming up in the new year and no time to spare for wife hunting. Perhaps the year after.”
“Or the year after that?” Lance suggested, flagrant amusement in his voice. “One can hardly tell how long your case might last. If I remember correctly, the battle over Sir George Downing’s will wasn’t settled for forty years.”
“I trust it won’t take that long,” Godric said dryly.