Escape
She stood in the inn yard, her trunks stacked neatly behind her.
The coach driven by the man hired by Margaret and Desmond had set her down nearly a half hour prior.
Jocelyn nodded to those who passed her, thinking one of them was the one meant to retrieve her.
Desmond had received promises that Mrs. Blanshard’s nephew would be waiting at the coaching inn, but Jocelyn’s assurance was quickly fading.
For months now, she had been confident someone had been watching her—following her upon the dark London streets in the depths of Covent Garden, where she performed in the theatre owned by Desmond and Margaret Marlow.
Many in the cast were misfits, just as was she.
Desmond had discovered Jocelyn sitting on the wooden walkway outside the door of the theatre.
According to Desmond, she had told him that her father had instructed Jocelyn on how a “gentle giant” would come for her.
Jocelyn had been afraid of the very tall man who had knelt before her and who had promised to see to her care, though, at the time, she simply prayed he would not eat her, for, to a five-year-old, Desmond was quite frightening in appearance.
Instead, the Marlows had dried her tears, fed her, and had taught her how to perform in their little theatre, making her something of a sensation.
Her father had never returned for her. Jocelyn could no longer even recall the look of his features.
Oddly, her father’s note, according to the Marlows, had never mentioned a mother.
“Everything had been so perfect,” she murmured under her breath as tears misted her eyes.
She knew no one in Yorkshire, having lived her whole life in London.
Jocelyn should never have told Margaret and Desmond about the feeling of uneasiness that had followed her around for nearly six months.
Even when she stopped and turned around in the recesses of the theatre she had known for nearly seventeen years, she had wanted to run away.
A feeling of dread was her constant companion.
Jocelyn was convinced someone followed her about.
Watching her. But when she stopped and turned around, no one was there.
Then less than a month prior, she had been walking to the theatre from her rooms in the Marlows’ boarding house, just as the sun had set and darkness began to cloak the City. She had heard footsteps behind her and turned quickly, but nobody was there.
The next evening, it was the same. And the next.
And the next. Then after a week, she thought she saw a man in an opera cloak, one with silver lining.
He watched her. On the seventh day, when she glanced back, a man, similarly dressed, was standing beneath the lamp, perhaps half a street away.
She could not see him clearly, and after a coach turned the corner, he was no longer there, but her instincts told her, somehow, he was still watching her.
She had told the Marlows, and they had sent her to Margaret’s childhood friend, Leonora Blanshard, in Yorkshire, so Jocelyn could rest and recuperate.
“All you require is some clean country air. Long walks on the moors.”
Jocelyn glanced about her. The view had been wonderful, and the private coach was a real treat.
The coachman and her travel mate were husband and wife, and the pair had been full of stories of their courtship and their relations, enough to fill the hours of a more-than-four-days’ journey.
Rolling hills. Ribbons of sparkling blue rivers.
Violet-gray valleys. Occasionally, there was a dilapidated house and barren fields, but more often the villages were neat and orderly.
She had never been beyond London’s streets or seen any other river beyond the Thames.
To Jocelyn, the open fields and whitewashed houses were like traveling through a painting she’d once seen on a gallery wall.
She looked around her again. There was a tea shop farther along the street, and she considered seeking out a cake and some tea.
The driver had last evening’s innkeeper pack a sack of bread and boiled chicken, but she and the Baileys had shared that food hours earlier.
Jocelyn had set her shoulders to call in at the shop when she spotted a carriage turn on the street at a greater speed than was safe.
It was sleek and shiny and pulled by a beautiful, well-cut horse.
The carriage stopped before her. “Sorry, miss. Crazy farmer and his sheep blocked the lane.” The man stepped down, circled his gig, and stopped to bow.
He was one of the most handsome men Jocelyn had ever beheld.
His face was quite tanned, his nose Roman, his eyes blue, and his thick hair auburn and curly.
He was tall and well-built. The cut of his clothes spoke more Mayfair than rural Yorkshire.
“Miss Byers, I am Claude DuBois. Mrs. Blanshard is my aunt. She sent me to fetch you back to the house.”
A long pause followed. “You are staring, Mr. DuBois.” Jocelyn reached for her bonnet and adjusted it. “Traveling leaves a lady less than fresh.”
“You misunderstand,” he rushed to say. “When Mrs. Blanshard asked me to fetch you to her home, I anticipated spending my evenings escorting two elderly ladies to musicals and church. Now, I am looking forward to something more pleasurable.”
“Mrs. Blanshard is a friend of my guardian. I came to Yorkshire for the fresh air and a rest from the hustle of London,” Jocelyn corrected.
He did not respond immediately. Instead, he placed her luggage in the back, assisted her on the steps, climbed up beside her, clicked his tongue, and set the horse in action, sending them out of the village and into the countryside.
“Tell me something about you,” he instructed without preamble.
“There’s not much to tell. I live with my guardians in London and assist in running their theatre.”
“No relatives?” he asked.
“None of which I am aware. Desmond Marlow found me on the street, sitting in the doorway of the theatre he owns. He took me in. No one has ever called there to ask after me.” She found herself frowning. Jocelyn was not one to make explanations regarding her life.
“Did not mean to make you uncomfortable,” he said into the awkward silence. “We just have so few visitors at Shard House.”
“My guardians simply thought I required a holiday,” she said, hiding her growing irritation. When a shadowy figure flashed behind her eyes, Jocelyn forced it from her mind. “What should I know of Shard House and Yorkshire? I have never traveled.”
“It’s a typical small estate. Country house. Tenant farms. Crops. Horses. A variety of other animals. A few neighborhood parties. But fewer young people than you might expect. Legends of haunted moors.”
Jocelyn turned her head sharply. “Pardon. Haunted moors?”
“Not the moors exactly. Just a conveyance driven by a headless figure. Supposedly, a young man disguised himself as a driver so he might elope with his lady love. Unfortunately, they were discovered. The girl was sent away, and the fellow lost his head for reaching too high. People say he roams the moor, and, if you hear the distant sound of a team of horses or the screams of a young woman, it is the lovers searching for each other.”
“Surely you jest?”
He laughed easily. “Maybe yes. Maybe no. You will discover it all for yourself.” He gestured widely to the countryside. “I truly love the moors, following in the steps of my ancestors.”
He turned the carriage between two bricked pillars.
They passed fields lying fallow, rows of white, square houses, each with a thatched roof, cows and sheep, and lines of trees.
Dappled sunshine. Clean air. They passed over a gray stone bridge that spanned a small river, which supposedly divided the estate in halves.
“The country has an odd effect on people. They either love it or fear it,” he said.
“I imagine many say the same of London,” she countered.
Mr. Dubois said, “Shard House is just up ahead.”
“I hope Mrs. Blanshard doesn’t consider my presence an imposition. Margaret speaks kindly of her friend. What should I expect?”
“Leonora? She is an absolute terror, that is until you come to know her. She can be gracious and generous, and the next moment she is bossy and demanding her own way. She has spirit and she adores spirit in others. She is a grand old eccentric of the first order. Some tolerate her. Personally, I adore her.”
“Margaret says her friend is a widow.”
“My uncle passed some ten years prior. People thought his passing would break her spirit, but within a week, she was out in society, not a speck of mourning clothes on her back. Wore red with gold trim. Shocked all her neighbors.”
“Oh, my,” Jocelyn murmured.
“Do not be frightened of Aunt Leonora. She will purposely attempt to shock you, but if you ignore her theatrics, you’ll find she’s a sweetheart.”
Jocelyn noticed a house on the other side of the tree line.
Mr. DuBois must have become aware of her interest. “It used to be the dower house,” he explained.
“It was presented to the land agent some twenty years back as payment for his family’s long loyalty to Blanshard.
The agent now frequently rents it out to those who wish to enjoy the countryside for a few months. ”
Eventually, Shard House came into view. The sun was setting behind it.
White columns. Four chimneys, as the house was longer than it was tall.
Only multiple stories in the middle. Whitewashed, when, in Jocelyn’s opinion, the natural bricks would have been more attractive.
Black shutters. Leaden glass that reflected the last rays of sunshine.
They remained silent. Words would destroy the moment. She was to reside in a country house for the next couple of months.
“Like it?” he asked as he stopped the carriage before the main door.
“How could anyone not?”
*
Mrs. Blanshard had been more boisterous than Jocelyn thought possible for a woman her age. “Your house is lovely, ma’am. I’m highly indebted to you for accepting me as your guest.”
“So, you like Yorkshire?” the woman asked.
“It’s a remarkable place.”
“I remember when we had a party nearly every week, just as if we were in London society. It was all quite spectacular,” the woman said wistfully.
Jocelyn could not imagine country life would be as active as a London Season, but she did not correct her hostess.
Little did Jocelyn know, she had stepped deeper into danger.