“I’ve heard that she was involved with Lord Granville,” he started
cautiously.
“Involved? Aye, that’s a pretty word for what it was.” The woman curled
her lip to reveal dark gaps where her front teeth had been. Her pink
tongue poked through. “Why do you want to know about that?”
“Someone’s killing sheep,” Harry said. “I’ve heard that Annie or perhaps
someone close to her might have a reason for doing it.”
“I don’t know nothing about those sheep.” She started to close the door.
Harry stuck his boot in the crack. “Does Annie?”
She shook.
Harry thought at first that he might have driven her to tears, then she
raised her head, and he saw her face was split by a grotesque smile.
“Maybe she does, does Annie,” she wheezed. “If they know about the
doings of the living in the fires of hell.”
“Then she’s dead?” Lady Georgina spoke for the first time.
Her crisp accent seemed to sober the woman. “Either that or might as
well be.” She leaned tiredly against the door. “Her name was Annie
Baker, you know. She was married. At least she was until /he/ came
sniffing after her.”
“Lord Granville?” Lady Georgina murmured.
“Aye. The devil hisself.” The woman sucked in her upper lip. “Annie
threw over Baker. She was Granville’s whore for as long as he wanted
her, which wasn’t long. Came back here with her belly big and stayed
just long enough to whelp. Then she took off again. Last I heard she was
spreading her legs for a cup of gin.” She looked suddenly wistful. “A
lass don’t last long as a gin slut, do she?”
“No,” Harry said quietly.
Lady Georgina looked stunned, and he was sorry he hadn’t been able to
talk her into staying behind at Woldsly Manor. He’d dragged her into a
cesspit.
“Thank you for telling us about Annie, Mrs. Pollard,” Harry spoke gently
to the old woman. Despite her hardened manner, it must have pained her
to talk about ancient hurts. “I’ve only one more question, and then
we’ll bother you no more. Do you know what happened to Mr. Baker?”
“Oh, him.” Mrs. Pollard waved a hand as if flicking away a fly. “Baker
took up with another lass. I’ve heard he even married her, though it
can’t be right in the church, him already married to Annie. Not that
Annie cares. Not anymore.” She closed the door.
Harry frowned, then decided he’d questioned the old woman enough. “Come,
my lady.” He took Lady Georgina’s elbow and escorted her back up the
path. As he was helping her into the gig, he glanced back.
The boy leaned on the corner of the cottage, head down, one bare foot on
top of the other. He’d probably heard every word his grandmother had
said about his mother. There weren’t enough hours in the day to solve
all the problems of this world. Da had said that often enough when Harry
had been growing up.
“Wait a moment, my lady.” Harry strode the short distance to the boy.
He looked up warily as Harry approached but didn’t move otherwise.
Harry looked down at him. “If she dies, or you find yourself without,
come to me. My name is Harry Pye. Repeat it.”
“Harry Pye,” the boy whispered.
“Good. Here, see if she’ll get you some clothes.”
He placed a shilling in the boy’s hand and returned to the gig without
waiting for thanks. It had been a sentimental gesture and one that was
probably useless. The old woman was as likely to use the shilling for
gin as to buy the boy new clothes. He climbed in the gig, ignoring Lady
Georgina’s smile, and took up the reins. When he glanced again at the
boy, he was staring at the coin in his hand. They pulled away.
“What an awful story.” Her smile had died.
“Yes.” Harry looked sideways at her. “I’m sorry you heard it.” He urged
the horse into a trot. Best to be off Granville land as soon as possible.
“I don’t think anyone in that family could be poisoning the sheep. The
Annie’s husband has got on with his life. Unless Annie came back?”
He shook his head. “If she’s been at the gin stalls all this time, she’s
no threat to anyone.”
Sheep grazed on either side of the road, a peaceful scene, in spite of
the lowering clouds and rising wind. Harry watched the surrounding area
narrowly. After yesterday, he was wary of an attack.
“Have you another farmer to visit today?” Lady Georgina held her hat to
her head with one hand.
“No, my lady. I—” They topped a rise, and Harry caught sight of what lay
on the other side. Abruptly he pulled on the reins. “Goddamn.”
The gig rolled to a stop. Harry stared at three lumps of wool lying just
inside the dry stone wall bordering the road.
“Are they dead?” Lady Georgina whispered.
“Yes.” Harry tied off the reins, set the brake, and leaped from the gig.
They weren’t the first to make the discovery. A sleek chestnut was
tethered to the wall, shaking its head nervously. The owner, a man, had
his back toward them, bent over one of the prone sheep. The man
straightened, revealing his height. His hair was brown. The cut of his
coat, flapping in the wind, was that of a gentleman. Just his luck
Thomas would find the poisoned sheep first.
The man turned, and Harry’s thoughts scattered. For a moment he couldn’t
think at all.
The man’s shoulders were broader than Thomas’s, his hair a shade
lighter, curling around his ears. His face was broad and handsome, laugh
lines framed his sensual lips, and his eyes had heavy lids. It couldn’t be.
The man approached and vaulted the stone wall easily. As he got nearer,
his green eyes glowed like phosphorus. Harry felt Lady Georgina come
alongside him. He realized absently that he’d forgotten to help her from
the gig.
“Harry,” he heard her say, “you never told me you had a brother.”
/Chapter Eight/ <LeopardPrince_toc.html#chapter_8>
It had always been her downfall: failing to think sufficiently before
speaking. This was brought home to George rather emphatically when both
men swung to look at her in shock. How was she to know it was some sort
of dark secret? She’d never seen eyes as green as Harry’s, and yet here
they were, the same green eyes, staring at her from another man’s face.
True, the other man was taller, and his features were of a different
cast. But who, looking at their eyes, could draw any other conclusion
than that they were brothers? She really couldn’t be blamed.
“Harry?” The stranger started forward. /“Harry?”/
“This is Bennet Granville, my lady.” Harry had recovered quicker than
the other man and was now expressionless. “Granville, Lady Georgina
Maitland.”
“My lady.” Mr. Granville bowed correctly. “It’s an honor to meet you.”
She curtsied and muttered the proper words by rote.
“And Harry.” For a moment, emotion flashed behind Mr. Granville’s
emerald eyes; then he controlled himse
lf. “It’s . . . been a while.”
George nearly snorted. In another year or so, he’d be as adept as Harry
at hiding his thoughts. “How long,
exactly?”
“What?” Mr. Granville seemed startled.
“Eighteen years.” Harry turned and glanced at the sheep, obviously
avoiding the subject. “Poisoned?”
Mr. Granville blinked, but caught on quickly enough. “I’m afraid so.
Would you like to take a look?” He turned and scrambled back over the wall.
Oh, for goodness sake! George rolled her eyes heavenward. Apparently
both men were going to ignore her faux pas and the fact that they hadn’t
seen each other for eighteen years.
“My lady?” Harry was holding out his hand, presumably to help her over
the wall.
“Yes, all right. I’m coming.”
He looked at her oddly. When she placed her hand in his, instead of
merely grasping it, he pulled her closer and then lifted her to sit on
the wall. George suppressed a squeal. His thumbs were just under her
breasts, and her nipples were suddenly sensitive. He gave her a warning
look.
What was he about? She felt herself flush.
He vaulted the wall and walked to Mr. Granville. George, left to her own
devices, swung her legs over and jumped down on the pasture side of the
wall. The men were looking at a pile of wilted weeds.
“These aren’t very old.” Harry toed a sodden stem. “Probably placed here
during the night. Hemlock again.”
“Again?” Mr. Granville, squatting next to the plants, looked up at him.
“Yes. It’s been going on for weeks now. Weren’t you told?”
“I’ve just arrived from London. I haven’t even been to Granville House
yet. Who is doing this?”
“Your father thinks it’s me.”
“You? Why would he—?” Mr. Granville cut himself off, then laughed
softly. “He’s finally paying for his sins.”
“Do you think?”
What was going on? George looked from one man to the other, trying to
decipher the undercurrents.
Mr. Granville nodded. “I’ll talk to him. See if I can get his mind off
you and onto whoever’s really doing this.”
“Will he listen to you?” Harry’s lips twisted cynically.
“Maybe.” The two men exchanged a look. Despite their differing heights
and features, their expressions were strikingly similar. They radiated
grimness.
“Do try to get your father to listen, Mr. Granville,” George said. “He’s
already threatened to arrest Harry.”
Harry scowled at George, but Mr. Granville grinned charmingly. “I shall
do my best, my lady, for /Harry./”
George realized she had been calling Mr. Pye, quite improperly, by his
given name. /Oh, pish./ She tilted her nose into the air and felt a
raindrop hit it.
Mr. Granville bowed again. “It’s a pleasure to have met you, Lady
Georgina. I hope that we can meet again under more amenable circumstances.”
Harry moved closer to George’s side, placing a hand at the small of her
back. She had the feeling he was scowling at Mr. Granville now.
She smiled all the brighter at her neighbor. “Indeed.”
“It’s good to see you, Harry,” Mr. Granville said.
Harry merely nodded.
The young man hesitated, then turned swiftly and leapt the wall. He
mounted and wheeled his horse in a half
circle to wave good-bye before cantering away.
“Show-off,” Harry muttered.
George blew out a breath and turned on him. “Is that all you’ve got to
say after seeing your brother for the first time in eighteen years?”
He arched his eyebrows at her, silent.
She threw up her arms in disgust and stomped over to the stone wall,
then stood dithering when she couldn’t find a toehold for her shoe.
Strong hands grabbed her from behind, again just under her breasts. This
time she did shriek.
Harry lifted her up and held her against his chest. “He’s not my
brother,” he growled in her ear, sending all sorts of interesting
thrills down her neck and elsewhere. Who knew the nerves in one’s neck
were connected to—
He set her rather firmly on the wall.
She scrambled over it and marched to the gig. “Then what is his
relationship to you?”
Instead of handing her into the carriage, Harry grasped her about the
middle again. She might become accustomed to this.
“He was a boyhood playmate, my lady.” He placed her on the seat.
George mourned the loss of his hands.
“You played with Thomas and Bennet Granville when you were little?” She
craned her neck to follow him as he circled the gig.
More drops of rain began to fall.
“Yes.” He climbed in and took up the reins. “I grew up on the estate,
remember. Thomas is about my age and Bennet a few years younger.” He
guided the horse onto the lane and set him to a trot.
“Yet you had not seen them since you left the Granville estate?”
“I was—/am/—the gamekeeper’s son.” A muscle bunched in his jaw. “There
was no reason we should see each other.”
“Oh.” She mulled over that. “Were you great friends? I mean, did you
like Bennet and Thomas?”
The rain increased. George hugged her cloak about her and hoped her
frock wouldn’t be ruined.
Harry looked at her as if she’d asked something extremely silly. “We
were boys growing up together. It didn’t much matter if we liked each
other.” He watched the horse for a bit, then said almost grudgingly, “I
daresay I got on better with Bennet even though Thomas was closer to my
age. Thomas always seemed such a milksop. He didn’t like fishing or
exploring or other things boys like to do for fear of getting his
clothes dirty.”
“Is that why you don’t trust Thomas now?”
“Because he was a milksop when he was a boy? No, my lady. Give me more
credit than that. He was always trying to get his father’s favor as a
lad. I doubt he’s changed much, just because he’s a man now. And since
Granville hates me . . .” He let his sentence trail away and shrugged.
/His father’s favor./ A firstborn son usually had that without question.
How strange that Thomas Granville did not. But she was more curious
about something else. “So you spent a lot of time in Bennet’s company
when you two were boys?”
Rain was dripping off the brim of Harry’s tricorn. “We played and I sat
in on his lessons if the tutor was in a good mood that day—and if
Granville wasn’t around.”
She frowned. “If Lord Granville wasn’t around?”
He nodded grimly. “The man hated me, even then. Said I had too much
pride for a gamekeeper’s son. But the tutor disliked his employer as
well. I think he got some small revenge in teaching me.”
“That’s where you learned to read and write.”
Harry nodded. “Bennet was better at letters than I, even though he was
younger, but I best him at numbers. So, yes, I spent quite a bit of time
with him.”
“What happened?”
He looked at he
r. “His father whipped my father when I was twelve and he
ten.”
George thought about what it would be like if she’d lost someone close
to her when she was twelve. Someone she saw every day. Someone she
fought and played with. Someone she took it for granted would always be
there. It would be like having a limb cut off.
How far would one go to correct such a wrong?
She shivered and looked up. They were at the river that divided the
Granville land from her own. Harry slowed the horse to a walk as it
splashed into the ford. The rain was coming down hard now, making the
muddy water jump. George looked downstream where the water deepened and
swirled in a whirlpool. A shape floated there.
“Harry.” She touched his arm and pointed.
He swore.
The horse waded from the stream, and he pulled the gig over, tying the
reins off quickly. He helped her down from the gig before walking to the
bank ahead of her. George’s shoes sank into the mud as she followed.