A Dangerous Collaboration (Veronica Speedwell #4)(98)

His eyes promised much and I shivered with anticipation as I nodded slowly.

“You are right, of course. This is hardly the place for that sort of thing. Does this mean you will stop torturing me by displaying yourself in various states of undress?”

“Not a chance.” He grinned. I kissed him again. I did not think of Caroline. She was in his past, buried the moment he dove into the sea to save me. She would not haunt us again.



* * *



? ? ?

We gathered Caspian and his mother and Mertensia in the drawing room for a council of war. Tiberius explained what Mrs. Trengrouse had done, breaking the news as gently as possible, but Mertensia took it poorly, dissolving into an unaccustomed bout of weeping. Helen, her fears eased, took it upon herself to console her sister-in-law, putting an arm around her shoulders and murmuring soothing platitudes.

Caspian, to my surprise, rose to the occasion. “We ought to search again,” he said. “We can press the entire island into service.”

“Where do you suggest we look?” I asked Caspian. He shrugged.

“Damn me if I know, if you will pardon my language. We played sardines all over this house, but apart from the priest’s holes, there are few proper hiding places and none large enough to hold a man for any length of time.”

I jumped to my feet. “Damn us all for blind fools,” I muttered, taking to my heels. Tiberius and Stoker were hard behind, following as I made my way to Malcolm’s bedchamber.

“We have already looked here,” Tiberius reminded me. I ignored him as I searched for the mechanism to expose the priest’s hole.

“Here.” Stoker reached past me to press the bit of carving. The panel shifted and I squeezed into the hideaway. Stoker pushed in behind me, holding a lamp aloft.

“Look there,” I said in triumph. On the dust of the floorboard was the clear imprint of a shoe, small and pointed. “A woman’s,” I said. “And left since we were here last.”

“What made you think of this place?” Stoker demanded.

“That,” I said, pointing to the back of the priest’s hole. “It is paneled where it ought to be stone. I only remembered it when Caspian mentioned the priest’s holes. It struck me as odd at the time, but I was too interested in the traveling bag to explore further.”

Stoker felt the panel on the back of the priest’s hole, running his hands carefully over the moldings.

Tiberius stuck his head into the stuffy little compartment. “What the devil are you doing? It is obviously empty.”

“And it is obviously only an antechamber,” Stoker told him. “Sometimes priest’s holes were made up of more than one chamber, and we ought to have realized it sooner.”

“How can you tell?” Tiberius challenged.

I explained about the paneling as Stoker resumed his explorations. We started at opposite ends of the panel and pressed towards the center without victory, neither of us having discovered the mechanism. I realized there was a commotion behind us and glanced backwards into the bedchamber to see Caspian and Mertensia and Helen gathered, watching anxiously.

I climbed out of the little chamber while Stoker put out his head to address Mertensia and Caspian. “I do not know which of you to ask, but I require permission to break down the wall.”

Aunt and nephew exchanged glances and nodded in unison. Before anyone could speak, Stoker returned to the hole and lifted one booted foot, slamming it hard into the panel. It made an ominous creak but did not break. Stoker braced his arms and positioned himself again, kicking the panel until it shattered with a deep moan of protest. He ripped at the broken boards until he made a hole large enough to admit him. I knew, even before I heard the soft intake of breath.

“He is there,” I murmured, eager for the others not to overhear just yet. It would be too upsetting for them to discover his corpse in situ.

“He is,” Stoker said, putting one leg over the broken panel to reach into the chamber beyond.

“Shall I tell them to leave?” I asked softly.

“No. Tell them to get out of the bloody way,” he ordered. “He is still alive. And he is not alone.”



* * *



? ? ?

I had to take Stoker’s word for Malcolm’s condition, for when Stoker emerged from the back passage carrying the man, I thought him certainly a corpse. He was bone white and unconscious, his breathing scarcely detectable. Helen burst into loud weeping, but Mertensia had recovered her composure. Stoker deposited Malcolm onto his bed and issued a series of commands with regard to treatments to be applied.

“Do you think him likely to die?” I asked as he assessed his condition.

“Possibly,” he said with a grim expression. “I saw neither food nor water in there. He is badly dehydrated and suffering from shock and the temperature. It is cold as the grave in there.”

I hardly dared to ask. “Is it Rosamund—” I began.

“No,” he said, clipping the word sharply. “Mrs. Trengrouse.”

He made another trip into the second priest’s hole to retrieve her. She was unconscious and Stoker handed her off with obvious distaste to Caspian. “Take her to her room. She is responsible for the attempted murder of myself, Tiberius, and Veronica, as well as your uncle. You will guard her and make certain she does not attempt to leave this house if she wakens,” he ordered, looking for all the world as imperious as his brother.