LITMIR.BIZ

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He nodded toward the shawl in my hand. “You will want something warmer than that if you mean to venture out on the moor. The sun is out, but it is deceptively chilly.”

      I swallowed hard, my fine breakfast suddenly sitting like a stone in my stomach. “Don’t let’s talk about the weather when you are clearly leaving. Did you even mean to say goodbye?”

      He shrugged. “I am bound for Scotland for a few days upon business.”

      “Business! I thought you had given up your inquiries.”

      “Never. I have merely closed my rooms in Half Moon Street for the present. I am conducting my investigations from Grimsgrave unless circumstances demand my presence. Such is the case I have undertaken in Edinburgh.”

      “Why cannot Monk look to this investigation?” Monk was the most capable of his associates, acting as confidant, valet, and majordomo for Brisbane as circumstances demanded. He was also a skilled investigator in his own right, and I had wondered at his absence from Grimsgrave. As a former military man, he ought to have had the place wholly organised and functioning smoothly in a fortnight.

      “Monk is already engaged upon a case, and I cannot spare him,” he replied, tidying his already immaculate cuffs. “I must see to this myself.”

      “And you thought to creep away whilst I was upstairs,” I observed coolly.

      His nostrils flared slightly with impatience. “I thought it would be rather easier if I left without a formal leave-taking.”

      “Easier upon whom?” I asked, wincing at the touch of acid in my voice.

      Brisbane noted it as well. “You’re playing it quite wrong,” he advised. “You ought to be disdainful and remote and tell me that you plan to go back to London and if I wish to see you, I will have to follow you there.”

      “I never manage to keep to a proper script,” I admitted. “I’ve too little pride in this instance. Oh, you are a devil, Brisbane. You knew last night you were leaving, didn’t you? That is why you did not pack me back to London by the first train. You thought you would slip out this morning and I would be so outraged at your behaviour I would leave of my own accord.”

      “Well, it was worth the attempt,” he conceded. “You do have a rather spectacular temper when you are roused.”

      “I do not,” I countered hotly. “I am the calmest, most collected—” I noted the gleam in his eye then and gave him a shove. He caught my hand and pressed it against his shirt-front. The linen was soft under my fingers, and just beneath it I could feel the slow, steady beating of his heart. I felt the heat rising in my face and pulled my hand away.

      “Do not think to distract me. You have business here as well, Brisbane. There are things that must be settled between us,” I said, sounding much more decisive than I felt.

      He opened his mouth to respond, but suddenly, his gaze shifted to a point just over my head and he dropped my hand. “Ailith is coming,” he murmured.

      I turned to greet her. She had donned a warm cloak of fine blue wool and draped a shawl of the same over her head. She looked like a Madonna fit to grace any master’s canvas.

      “You are dressed better than I for the moor wind, I think,” I told her. “Brisbane was just saying—” I turned, but the hall was empty, the door swinging wide upon its hinges. “Where the devil did he go?” I demanded.

      Ailith dropped her eyes at my language, and I made a mental note to exercise a bit more decorum.

      “I saw no one,” she said. I did not doubt it. Brisbane had certainly heard her step upon the stair and seen the distinctive blue hem of her gown. All it had taken was a moment’s misdirection on his part, skilful as any conjurer, and my attention was diverted long enough for him to make his escape.

      “Blast him,” I muttered. But I had no intention of discussing the matter with Ailith Allenby, and it occurred to me that Brisbane’s absence might be a perfect opportunity for me to take the lay of the land. Brisbane had been terribly mysterious about his doings at Grimsgrave, and I was very keen to know the full extent of his troubles.

      I looked at Ailith and realised I was still grumbling to myself, for she was looking at me with the gentle, quizzical glance that nurses reserve for mentally defective patients.

      “Never mind,” I said, forcing my voice to cheerfulness. “I believe I am poorly dressed for an excursion on the moor.”

      She looked at the tiny feathered hat perched atop my head and frowned. “I am afraid that will never do, my lady. The moor wind will whip it away, and your ears would be quite chilled. And that thin shawl will not keep out a bit of the wind. Let me find you a proper shawl.”

      She hastened off, returning a moment later with another heavy length of blue wool and a pair of alarmingly ugly rubber boots. I stood very still as she wrapped my head with the scarf, trying not to think about how trying blue was against my complexion and trying not to breathe too deeply. The shawl still smelled of the sheep it had been shorn from. She wrapped it tightly, unlike her own elegant drape, and tucked the ends firmly into my skirt, plumping my waist unbecomingly.

      She clucked over my boots, insisting I remove them on the grounds they would be instantly ruined in the mud. Flat boots or pattens, she advised me, although rubber boots were by far the best. She fitted me with a pair that pinched a little—in spite of her height, Miss Allenby had tiny feet—and declared us ready. She looped a basket over her arm and we left the house by the kitchen door, and as we walked it suddenly occurred to me to wonder why Brisbane had referred to Ailith Allenby by her Christian name.

      THE FIFTH CHAPTER

      

      My flocks feed not, my ewes breed not,

      My rams speed not, all is amiss.

      —William Shakespeare

      “The Passionate Pilgrim XVII”

      

      We passed into a garden, or rather, what had once been a garden. Sheltered by high stone walls, it was a peaceful place that had clearly once been a productive one as well. Gnarled old fruit trees sprawled against the walls, but it was easy to see the bones of where they had once been espaliered. Beds, edged in crumbling brick, were thick with weeds and overgrown bushes, and just at the edge, sheltered in the recess of a wall, a set of beehives stood quiet and empty. A small plot was still in cultivation, but it had been planted with an eye to industry rather than beauty. It bore none of the traces of elegance that lingered yet in the rest of the garden.

      Miss Allenby saw my interest and the faintest of blushes tinged her cheeks. “The gardens of Grimsgrave were once renowned for their beauty. Even the kitchen garden was lovely. It has been many years since we have had gardeners to tend them. Godwin does what little he can with this plot, and Mama still has a tiny garden for her flowers.” She gestured toward a sunny spot where a listless bunch of daffodils struggled limply out of the dark, peaty soil. “Most of our vegetables are delivered by folk who used to be our tenant farmers,” she added, her tone edged with emotion—nostalgia perhaps?

      She motioned toward the far end of the garden where a rotting wooden door sagged in the stone wall. I turned back, eager to see Grimsgrave Hall in the clear light of day. It was almost as forbidding as it had been by moonlight. The native gritstone, once handsome no doubt, had weathered to blackness, giving the entire façade a gloomy cast. The ruined wing put me in mind of a skeleton, its flesh rotted away from the bones. But the structure itself, Jacobean in design, was elegant if old-fashioned. Properly rebuilt and with thoughtful landscaping, it might still be redeemed.

      “It would take a miracle from God and more money than I will ever see in my lifetime to rebuild it,” Miss Allenby commented, intuiting my thoughts.

      “It is a handsome place,” I offered, following slowly as she led the way to the wooden door.

      “Handsome, but rotten through and through. I have a model of

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