A Lady Under Siege(79)

“I think so.”

“What would you like to tell him?”

“I want to tell him to go away. Right now I want to get to know Derek. Or I’d like to, except I have to get Betsy from Sunday school in about seven minutes.”

“That’s too bad,” he smiled. “I was going to tell you to put your feet up, make yourself a cup of tea, or roll one up and spark it, for that matter—I was going to zip upstairs and shower and shave, and come back down all smooth-faced, baby fresh, and we’d pick it up from there. I clean up real good. No harsh chemicals—Ivory soap.”

“Clean is always good.” She looked up into his broad, smiling face and, unexpectedly, felt a shock of recognition. That hint of a flinty glare in his eyes—was it Derek, or Thomas? Or was it the light of two hearts? She kissed her finger and touched it to Derek’s lips.

“I’ll see you soon,” she whispered. She glanced at her watch. “Why do I always have to be somewhere else?”





39





A thousand glittering ripples danced across the lake in the afternoon sun. Thomas, at the water’s edge, turned and tramped across the lush grass of a meadow that bordered the shore, and climbed a small hill to higher ground, where a blanket had been spread. Sylvanne sat upon it, encircled by her gown, her knees drawn up and held tightly in her arms. She watched Thomas approach with a mixture of emotions. The despondency she had felt on the night he came to her bed had seen its jagged edges softened by his actions since. He’d been as good as his word—the man had bestowed nothing but kindness upon her.

The biggest change was that he had ceased to hold her hostage, and now allowed her to move freely around and about the castle. Thus liberated, she in turn had pleased him greatly by restoring her good relations with his daughter Daphne. The girl had led her on a wide-ranging tour of her favourite hidden corners of “my palace,” as she liked to call it, and they had passed the previous two afternoons out of doors, nestled in a secretive nook along the castle’s outer wall, where they could sit upon a grassy bank and watch swans skim across the glassy surface of the moat. Thomas had visited them there on the second day, and seeing how soothed Sylvanne looked by the tranquil movement of the water, he proposed an outing for the next day to another, more spectacular waterscape. “We’ll make the journey on horses, just we two,” he’d said, which had stoked the adolescent ire of Daphne. She had beseeched her father to allow her to come along, but he would not be moved. “After your last adventure on horseback, I think it best you continue to rest. Besides, I have no milder horse than Mathilde to give you,” he’d said.

“I think you have another motive,” Daphne had responded petulantly. “You want Lady Sylvanne to yourself.”

If so, then his wish had now come true, for here they sat, alone together under a vast blue canopy of sky, with a fine view of a pretty lake and the surrounding countryside of fields and groves. “I wanted you to see this place and be dazzled by its beauty,” he said. “I can hardly believe my good fortune at possessing such a lake, set like a jewel entirely within my own lands. I used to bring my beloved wife here on a summer’s day—we both believed that Daphne was conceived on a smooth stone along the far shore, a secluded yet sun-drenched secret spot, which we christened the Altar of our Love.” He stopped abruptly, worried that perhaps he’d overstepped propriety by sharing such an intimate detail. He glanced at Sylvanne to gauge her mood, and decided that she seemed unoffended, and contented enough.

“I’m grateful to know this place,” she said. He waited for her to say more, but she sat on the warm blanket and was silent.

“What is your opinion of me?” he said suddenly.

She brought a hand up to shield her eyes from the sun’s brightness and looked at him. “I’ve let myself be brought here without a chaperone,” she said. “So I must trust you, I suppose.”

“That’s a start,” he said. “A good one.”

“You haven’t mentioned that other woman for two full days,” Sylvanne said. “Is it because she directed you not to, or has she vacated your dreams?”

“You know as well as I that she desires to be kept out of it.”

“Yet I’m curious about her,” Sylvanne replied. “If you’re to be believed, then I feel myself inhabited by a phantom.”

“Leaving her aside has made me appreciate your own unique virtues.”