Page 59 of The Duke’s Suspicion

She refolded the note, tucked it between the pages of her journal. Could she do it? Go into a crowd of strangers? Ignore the judgment in their eyes? She’d done it often enough, it was true, but she was no actress. What had she been thinking when she agreed to play this part? She looked into Remington’s face. “What if I fail?”

“You won’t, Miss Erica.” His voice sounded far away, muffled by the cotton wool. “You can’t. Otherwise, the real culprit may suspect what’s afoot.”

With a sigh, she plucked the cotton from her ears, then reached behind her back and tugged loose the apron strings, slipped the garment over her shoulders, and laid it carefully on the bench. Finally she rose, gathered her journal, and nodded once. She had promised herself she would be brave. She would do this for him.

* * * *

In some ways, the dinner itself was worse that all her lurid, distorted nightmares, for no amount of fidgeting or pressing her fingertips to her eyelids or pinching her thigh through the layers of her skirts could dispel it or give her a moment’s peace. For the most part, the other guests moved and spoke and ate as if she were utterly invisible—a prospect that, while pleasing in theory for one who generally felt awkward in company, turned out to be miserable in practice. Tristan held himself aloof, neither polite nor impolite. No one seemed to remark his behavior to her either way. The matter of their midnight escapade had, it seemed, been pushed aside by the greater thrill of a spy in their midst, although no one spoke of it.

Except, that was, Lady Lydgate. “Did you hear the news?” she asked Captain Whitby in an overloud voice. “The Duke of Raynham received a confidential missive from his colonel just this day and repaired to the library to pore over it for hours.” A glance over her shoulder at the last, to confirm Erica was in earshot. “I wonder what news it contained.” Erica pointedly looked the other way before the woman was tempted to say more.

Only the duchess behaved with kindness toward her. More than her usual kindness, in fact. So much so that Erica caught herself wondering whether she too was only playing a part. When they approached the table, she discovered the duchess had gone so far as to have the seating irregularly arranged. Erica sat down at her right hand.

“Are you feeling quite well, Miss Burke?” the duchess inquired over soup.

“Yes, Your Grace. Perfectly well.”

While the fish was being served, she said, “I worry that you spend too much time in the heat of the conservatory.”

“Undoubtedly, Your Grace. I have a regrettable tendency to lose track of time.”

“You need a good night’s rest,” she declared later as she drove her spoon into a mound of frothy syllabub, her brow creased with concern. “The house will, I hope, be perfectly quiet tonight. No storms, no…disturbances. Nothing at all to draw you from your bed.”

“No, Your Grace.”

“Allow me to send my maid to you. She prepares a sleep tonic that has always worked without fail.”

Oh, dear. The duchess, disinclined to think ill of anyone, seemed determined to do everything in her power to put Erica beyond the power of suspicion, even if it required drugging her into a stupor. Next she would suggest setting a guard outside Erica’s chamber door to ensure an unbroken night’s rest, and if she did that, the whole plan would be ruined, for everyone must believe she was free to roam.

With very little hope of aid, given that Tristan had hardly looked her way all evening, she sent a desperate glance twenty feet down the table.

He gave no sign of having seen her silent plea.

“Or perhaps a—” the duchess began. But before she could complete the suggestion, Tristan laid his palm flat against the table and gave a nod in his stepmother’s direction. Immediately, she rose and laid aside her napkin. “Shall we leave the gentlemen to their port, ladies?”

Amid the scrape of chairs, the rustle of silk, and the murmur of conversation as the women rose as one to withdraw, Erica longed to slip from the room. But to do so would disrupt all their careful plans. So she waited, sipped tea, pretended not to hear Lady Lydgate’s speculations.

After some time, the gentlemen joined them. All but Tristan. “The butler came bearing an urgent missive from Mr. Davies and he left,” Mr. Newsome explained in answer to the duchess’ query.

At first, Erica’s heart fluttered in alarm. An emergency? Something to do with her sister? But of course it must be a ruse, a further attempt to assure the spy in their midst that Tristan had left his papers—and the house itself—unguarded.

No one suggested cards or forfeits tonight. While the evening was yet young, they retired to their separate chambers, curious glances darted among the company. “Good night,” Erica said firmly as she closed her door.

But before many moments had passed, she opened it again. In the corridor all was silent. No one watched as she made her way to the library.

Every pair of draperies but one had been tightly drawn, and the sliver of light that passed between those, red with the setting sun, only made the rest of the room darker in comparison. Dark, and silent as the grave she discovered as she stepped across the thick carpet toward the desk. Papers had been scattered across its otherwise empty top with apparent carelessness. A circle of wax on the edge of one sheet marked it as a letter, a long letter. Three sheets, at least, and no doubt a masterful imitation of what it pretended to be: confidential correspondence between Major Laurens and his colonel. Without a candle, she could not hope to make out a word. She walked on.

Three sides of the library were lined with bookshelves, surrounding the doorway and running up both sides of the twin fireplaces that stood at either end of the long room. Near the middle of the room stood the desk, neither facing the wall of windows nor turned away from it, as if the one who had positioned it had feared the tempting view but not enough to shut it out entirely.

She oughtn’t to be here, she knew. Her presence might upend everything. But fatigue had made her more restless than usual and she could not keep away, though she doubted her ability to sit still long enough to catch a spy. She was frightened. Frightened for Tristan. Frightened of what failure tonight might mean for them both.

What of success, though? What would it look like? Each of them going their separate ways, their separate dreams still firmly grasped, unaltered by what was really, when all was said and done, nothing more than a few days trapped under the same roof by a bit of rain?

Well, more than a bit of rain…

Water moved ships. It wore away mountains. Surely, it could soften a stony heart, too?

If it had not been fear she’d glimpsed that morning in Tristan’s eyes, then what was it?