“I shall remember that, madam.”
In the library Lucas sat down again and reached for the next aging ledger. He realized Satherwaite was watching him with an expression of deep curiosity.
“My wife, as you can see, will be taking an active interest in the estate,” Lucas remarked.
“Yes, my lord. She appears to have a rather keen interest in local matters.”
Lucas smiled complacently. “Lady Stonevale is a woman of great energy and enthusiasm. She has been needing an interesting challenge to occupy her full attention.”
“Shopping in our poor village was certainly an act of gracious mercy on her part. I cannot imagine a lady of her excellent taste finding anything she truly desired in the local shops.”
“I believe the point was to do something for the local economy,” Lucas mused. “And I am grateful to her. It will take both of us to save Stonevale. As I said, we are facing a challenge.”
Satherwaite looked at the stack of journals and ledgers that stood on the desk. “No offense, sir, but rescuing these lands presents enough of a challenge to occupy a regiment.” He looked back at his employer with a hint of the sort of hero worship a young man often feels for an older male who has seen combat. “Of course, you have had some experience with military matters, sir.”
“Just between you and me, Satherwaite, I don’t mind telling you that I find the challenge of making this land productive again infinitely more appealing than the business of war.”
Satherwaite, who clearly did not see how anything could be more exciting than the business of war, wisely kept his mouth shut and opened the journal in front of him.
Later that evening Lucas leaned back in his chair, stretched his feet out toward the fire, and indulged himself in the purely masculine pleasure of watching his wife pour after-dinner tea in the drawing room.
It was a small thing, this matter of pouring the tea, but it seemed to symbolize so much. He was not so foolish as to think Victoria had surrendered to the inevitable yet, but he saw the distinctly wifely act as a definite step in that direction.
He suddenly realized that in common with most of his sex, he was not given to a great deal of idle reflection on all the small routines that turned a household into a home. At least, he had not been particularly conscious of them until recently when, having gotten himself a wife, he had discovered he had not automatically gotten all the little niceties that were supposed to come along with one.
For the past three days he had been living in a state of armed truce, a truce that was only an inch away from open warfare. Nothing in the household had been seen to beyond such minimal matters as producing meals and emptying chamber pots. Griggs had been getting desperate. Mrs. Sneath had threatened to quit because of overwork.
But as of the moment of Victoria’s return from the village, things had begun to change. Lucas realized he thirsted mightily for each small sip of the honey of domestic harmony. Having his tea poured for him by Victoria was one such golden drop. It was the first he’d tasted since he’d taken his wedding vows.
“About the legend of the Amber Lady, my lord,” Victoria said coolly as she handed him his cup and saucer. “I would like to hear the details now, if you please.”
“I confess I do not know all of the tale.” Lucas stirred his tea, trying to think of ways to stretch out the conversation. Victoria was in the habit of rushing off to bed early lately. “My uncle mentioned the matter shortly before he died. It was in conjunction with the pendant he gave me.” He frowned, wishing he had not called her attention to the amber around her throat. Victoria appeared totally oblivious of the fact that she wore it twenty-four hours a day. “I asked for the story, but you must realize my uncle was a bitter, ill-tempered man. To top it off, when I saw him, he was on his deathbed and not particularly inclined to humor me or anyone else.”
“What did he tell you?”
“Just that the pendant had been handed down through the family for several generations. It apparently belonged to the first lord of Stonevale. My uncle said I might get more information from the villagers. I asked Mrs. Sneath about it. As you know, she was about the only member of the staff left when the old bastard died. He had turned off everyone else.
“Go on, what did Mrs. Sneath say?”
Lucas looked at her and saw the. bright curiosity shining in her beautiful eyes. “Having met Mrs. Sneath, you must know she is not the talkative sort. But she did tell me that the villagers tell an old children’s story about the first lord of Stonevale and his lady. The man had been dubbed the Amber Knight because of the colors he wore into battle.”
“So he was a warrior, too,” Victoria murmured, staring into the fire.
“Most men who acquired estates the size of Stonevale were,” Lucas pointed out dryly.
“They called his wife the Amber Lady?”
Lucas nodded. “According to the legend, the lord and his lady were very much in love and devoted to the land and the people on it. Stonevale grew prosperous under their guidance. Several generations of happily married men succeeded the first and the lands flourished. People began to say that the well-being of the estate and its surrounding lands was contingent on the happiness of the lord and lady who lived in the great house.”
Victoria frowned. “A rather precarious thing on which to hang the welfare of this entire region.”
“It is just a superstition, Vicky.”
“I know, but—”
Lucas interrupted her swiftly. “According to Mrs. Sneath, it became a saying in the village that the Earls of Stonevale must marry for love or the lands would suffer. Given the wealth of the estate, it was very convenient for each succeeding earl to make a love match rather than a business match.”
“Very convenient. There was no need to marry for money until the present generation, I take it?”
Lucas hurried on, anxious to skirt the quicksand he sensed waiting for him in that direction. “At any rate, three generations back, the Earl of Stonevale fell in love with a young woman who, it seemed, had already given her heart to another.” Lucas paused. “Not only her heart, but everything else, apparently. Her family rushed her into the marriage knowing she was carrying another man’s babe, the child of a penniless second son who left for America when he found out she had married the Earl of Stonevale.”
“That poor girl. How sad for her to be forced to marry a man she did not love. But her family was not about to lose the opportunity of having their daughter become a countess, I suppose,” Victoria murmured with a touch of bitterness.
“Probably not,” Lucas agreed. “But as long as you are overflowing with sympathy for the young lady, you might spare some for my ancestor who found himself tied to a woman who was not exactly a virgin on her wedding night.”
Victoria’s gaze turned even more frosty. “So? I did not come to this marriage a virgin, either, if you will recall.
“It is hardly the same thing, given the fact that I was the one and only man you slept with before the wedding. In any event,” Lucas added, feeling a little dangerous now himself, “we haven’t even had a wedding night, so your point is irrelevant, to say the least.”
“Do you know, Lucas, I do not see why your ancestor or you or any other man has any right to expect his wife to be a virgin. You men certainly do not bother to remain in a chaste state until your wedding nights.”
“There is the little matter of attempting to ensure one’s children are one’s own.”
Victoria shrugged. “Aunt Cleo one told me that women have been inventing ways to feign virginity for as long as men have been so arrogant as to insist upon it. Even if one is certain one’s wife is a virgin at marriage, that still does not ensure her children are not the footman’s by-blows, does it?”
“Victoria …”
“No, it would seem to me, my lord, that the only way a man can be relatively certain his children are his own is if he truly trusts his wife and knows he can believe her when she tells him they are his.”
“I trust y
ou, Victoria,” Lucas said softly.
“Well, as you said, ’tis all irrelevant as far as we are concerned, is it not?”
“Not entirely,” he muttered. “Victoria, could we please get on with the legend?”
She blinked and occupied herself with the teapot. “Yes, of course. Kindly continue with the story, my lord.”
Lucas took a swallow of tea, wondering how in hell he had allowed the conversation to get so wildly off track. “The earl had his suspicions, but no proof, and since he was very much in love with his new wife, he decided to believe what he wanted to believe. That worked until the babe was born dead. His lady was so grief-stricken that she lost her wits. She confessed all, blamed her unhappiness on her husband for having made it impossible to marry her true love, and claimed she was now so miserable she wanted to die. Then she promptly did precisely that.”
Victoria’s eyes flew to his, deep suspicion in her amber gaze. “How?”
“Pray do not look at me like that. He didn’t kill her, you know. She simply never recovered from childbirth. Mrs. Sneath says the legend has it that she willed herself to die and the fever obligingly took her.”
“What a tragic story. What did the earl do?”
“He grew bitter and cynical toward all women. There was pressure from the family to produce an heir, so he eventually remarried. But this time not for love. It was strictly a business decision on his part and he and his second wife hardly formed what could be called a happily married couple. In fact, after the required heir was born, the earl and his wife spent very little time together and none at all at Stonevale, apparently.”
“Was that when the lands began to go into a decline?”
Lucas nodded. “Yes, according to the tale and to the old ledgers and records. I went through several of them today just out of curiosity and I must admit one can trace the gradual decline of the estate to that disastrous marriage three generations ago.”
“Truly?”
“Yes, truly. The next earl, my uncle’s father, was not only a cold and bitter man, he was also a rake and a poor gamester. He started the tradition of the Earls of Stonevale spending more time at the gaming tables and less on their lands. He, too, eventually married, but not for love. Once my uncle was born, his father and mother went their separate ways,” Lucas said.
“And the lands continued to decline. Hardly surprising, given the lack of interest on the part of the masters. What about your uncle?”
“Maitland Colebrook never even bothered to marry for the sake of the title or anything else, let alone love. He concentrated instead on going through what was left of the family fortune. He bled the estate dry and then retired to the country to rail against his ill fate.”
“So that is how the villagers explain their present impoverished situation.” Victoria stared thoughtfully into the fire again. “Interesting.”
Lucas studied her averted profile, wondering what she would do if he pulled her into his lap and kissed her. Would she melt for him the way she always had in the past or would she use her nails on his eyes and cut him to shreds with her tongue? One thing was for certain, when he eventually got around to taking her into his arms, it would be a real adventure for all concerned.
“The most interesting part is that business of the Hawkins child in the village calling you the Amber Lady,” Lucas said quietly.
“Why is that? She had obviously been told the tale, and when she saw me dressed in that particular shade of yellow, she jumped to a child’s conclusion.”
Lucas watched the firelight bring out the amber and gold in Victoria’s tawny brown hair. “I am not so certain she jumped to the wrong conclusion. There is something rather amberish about you, you know. Your eyes, your hair, the colors you choose to wear.”
She glared at him. “For heaven’s sake, Lucas, do not talk such nonsense.”
He held out his cup for more tea. “It is little wonder the child would like to believe you are the Amber Lady. I have not yet told you the last bit of the legend.”
She glanced at him warily as she poured tea into his cup. “How does the tale conclude?”
“’Tis said that one day the Amber Knight and his lady will return to the great house and the lands of Stonevale will once more prosper along with their love.”
“What a tidy ending,” Victoria said scornfully. “But if the luck of the region depends upon the lord and lady marrying for love, then it is obvious everyone around here will have to wait for another chance at bettering their fortunes. The newest Earl of Stonevale married for money, not love.”
“Damn it, Vicky ….”
She was already on her feet. “If you will excuse me, my lord, I will bid you good night. I grow weary.”
Lucas swore again as he got to his feet. He waited until the door had closed behind her before he put down his teacup and, with cold deliberation, went across the room to pick up the brandy decanter.
Idly he massaged his aching leg. It was going to be a long night.
Three hours later as Lucas lay awake in bed listening to the soft sounds in the room next door, he wondered if he was being a fool to continue to restrain himself. Maybe this waiting game was not such wise strategy after all.
He heard another whisper of movement from the next chamber. It sounded as if Victoria had gotten out of bed. It was obvious she was not yet asleep. Perhaps she was afraid to go to sleep too early for fear of inducing another nightmare.
There was nothing like the sort of passion they could experience together to ward off bad dreams, Lucas told himself. As a concerned husband he owed her what comfort and reassurance he could give her, even if he had to force it on her.
Resolutely he pushed back the covers and reached for his dressing gown. This had gone far enough. One way or the other they had to form a normal marital relationship and it was rapidly becoming clear that his self-imposed restraint was having no effect whatsoever on her recalcitrance.
In other words, he thought ruefully, she was hardly begging for his lovemaking.
He heard the outer door to her bedchamber open and close just as he lifted his hand to knock on the connecting door. Quietly he twisted the knob and stepped into his wife’s empty room.
Fury and panic seized him. Surely she was not idiotic enough to run off in the middle of the night. Then he recalled that Victoria was very much accustomed to running about in the dead of night. He had even taught her something about how it was done.
Lucas put down his candle and hastily pulled on breeches, boots, and a shirt. A few minutes later he was moving swiftly down the hall. His instincts told him she would leave via the kitchen door. It was the way he would have gone if he had been trying to sneak out of the house. He hurried after her.
A few minutes later he emerged from the house. He saw Victoria almost at once. She was standing quietly in the dilapidated, sadly overgrown kitchen garden. She was wearing her long, hooded, amber-colored cloak to ward off the chill and she was bathed in moonlight. Memories of all those other nights when he had rendezvoused with her in her aunt’s garden swept over him, leaving him filled with a hunger that was sharpened to the point of pain.
This was his wife and he wanted her.
Lucas stepped slowly out into the shadows, making no sound. But she sensed his presence and turned toward him. He sucked in his breath.
“I have missed our midnight meetings in the garden,” he said softly.
“You wooed me most cleverly when you promised me adventure in the middle of the night, did you not? I succumbed to that lure as I would have succumbed to no other.”
His stomach clenched at the soft bitterness in her voice. “Were you going to seek an adventure on your own tonight, Vicky? I doubt there are any gaming hells or brothels or inns filled with young lordlings and their opera dancers in the village.” He walked toward her until he was standing only a short distance away.
“I merely wanted to walk,” she said quietly.
“Will you allow me to accompany you?”
br /> “Have I any choice in the matter?”
“No.” As if he would allow her to wander around out here alone at night, Lucas thought. “Where were you planning to walk?”
“I am not certain. I had not really thought about it.”
He considered quickly, trying to remember what he had seen during the past few days as he had ridden over his lands. “There is an empty cottage not far from here. I believe it belonged to the gamekeeper back in the days when Stonevale had a gamekeeper. Why don’t we walk there and back?”
“All right.” She fell silent.
“It is a lovely night, is it not?”
“I find it rather chilly,” she told him distantly.
“Yes,” Lucas agreed thinking swiftly. There was some old firewood stacked outside the cottage, he recalled. Too bad he had not ordered the place cleaned yesterday when he’d examined it. He stumbled slightly over a nonexistent stone and stifled a small groan.
“What is the matter with you?” Victoria asked, frowning in annoyance.
“Nothing important. My leg is acting up a bit tonight.” He tried to sound stoic and brave.
“Really, Lucas, I should think you would have learned by now not to go about in the cold night air when it is paining you.”
“You are undoubtedly correct about that, madam. But you seem to favor running about at night and that leaves me with little choice but to accompany you.”
“You should have gone after an heiress who is not fond of this sort of sport,” she told him. “The Perfect Miss Pilkington would have done nicely for you.”
“Do you think so? I admit she was on Jessica Atherton’s list, but somehow I could not seem to work up much enthusiasm. There was something a bit boring about the prospect of being married to Miss Pilkington. As you and Annabella said, she was a bit too much like Lady Atherton.”
Victoria retreated deeper into the hood of her cloak until her voice was muffled. “You are right on that account. If you think Lady Atherton has grown somewhat dull over the years, you should see Miss Pilkington. Do not mistake me. She is very nice but she’s only nineteen and she told me herself, she believes she may have a religious calling.”