A Lady by Midnight (Spindle Cove #3)(30)

“I don’t suppose it’s too much to hope that you might . . . remember something?” Lark asked. “I don’t want to pressure you, but we thought that perhaps after seeing the portrait and being around our family, some forgotten detail might shake loose.”

“Perhaps it will in time. But truly, I have so few memories.” Kate let her eyes go unfocused. “I’ve tried, so many times, to recall. It’s as though I’m traveling down a dark, endless corridor, and my past is at the end of it. And I know . . . I just know . . . if I could open the door at the end of that corridor, I’d remember everything. But I never quite get there. I only hear pianoforte music, and I have some memory of the color blue.”

“Perhaps it’s the pendant,” Lark said. She fetched the portrait from the mantelpiece. “The one about her neck, see?”

Kate looked closely. She’d noticed the pendant before—but in the dark last night, it had appeared to be black. Now she could see that it was actually a deep, almost indigo blue. Too dark to be a sapphire. Perhaps lapis?

She lifted her head, excited. “I suppose that could be the blue I recall. Especially if my mother wore it always.”

“She must have done,” said Harry. “She even wore it when she wore nothing at all.”

Kate startled. “Oh. And there’s a little song. A song about flowers.”

She sang it all the way through for them, beginning with, “See the garden of blossoms so fair . . .”

“It’s been lodged in my memory all my life, but in all my years of teaching music, I’ve never met anyone else who knew that song. I always fancied my mother sang it to me. Is it familiar to any of you?”

The Gramercys shook their heads.

“But the fact that we don’t know the song doesn’t mean anything,” Lark said. “We never would have met your mother at all.”

Kate’s shoulders relaxed. “It would be nice if that could have been the link. The proof. But I suppose it was too much too hope.”

“Nothing is too much to hope.” Aunt Marmoset patted her hand. “And dear, we really must decide what to call you. If you’re family, ‘Miss Taylor’ just doesn’t seem right.”

“It’s not even my name at all,” Kate admitted. “The surname Taylor was assigned to me at Margate. Really, I’d love it if you’d call me Kate. All my friends do.”

Even though her full name had been listed as Katherine, she’d always gone by Kate. It simply fit. “Katherine” sounded too refined and regal. “Kitty” brought to mind a flighty young girl. But “Kate” sounded like a sensible, clever young woman with lots of friends.

She was a “Kate.”

Except to someone, somewhere, she’d once been “Katie.”

Be brave, my Katie.

And today, when Thorne had pinned her to the ground, acting with courage to guard her life with his own—even if the threat was a wayward fruit, rather than a mortar shell—he’d called her “Katie,” too. So strange.

“Will you show us the local sights?” Lark asked. “I’m dying to explore that old castle on the bluffs.”

Kate bit her lip. “Perhaps we should save that for tomorrow. The militia are undertaking some drills. But I’d be delighted to give you a tour of the church.”

“Hold that thought.” Lord Drewe held back the curtain. “I believe our things have arrived.”

Kate watched, amazed, as a caravan of one, two . . . three carriages pulled up before the Queen’s Ruby, all of them bursting with valises and trunks. They must have contained enough belongings and supplies to launch a small colony.

“Thank the Lord,” said Aunt Marmoset. “I’m down to my last three spice drops.”

Chapter Nine

Thorne was a man of habit.

That evening, after all the men had left, he returned to his solitary quarters—one of the four turrets that comprised the Rycliff Castle keep. He brushed the dust from his officer’s coat and polished his boots to a fresh shine, so they’d be ready the next day.

Then he sat down at the small, simple table to review the day’s events.

This, too, was routine. In the infantry, he’d served under then-Lieutenant Colonel Bramwell, now Lord General Rycliff. After every battle, Rycliff would sit down with his maps and journals to painstakingly recreate the order of events. Thorne would help him to recall the details. Together, they laid it all out before them. What had happened, exactly? Where had key decisions been taken? Where had ground been gained, lives been lost?

Most importantly, they asked themselves this: Could anything have been done differently, to achieve a more favorable outcome?

In most cases, they arrived honestly at the same answer: no. Given a chance, they would do the same again. The ritual dampened any whispers of guilt or regret. Left unchecked, such whispers could become echoes—bouncing off the walls of a man’s skull. Growing louder, faster, more dangerous over weeks and months and years.

Thorne knew the echoes. He had enough of them rattling around his brain already. He didn’t need any more. So tonight he poured himself a tumbler of whiskey and reviewed the events of his most recent conflict.

The Melon Siege.

Could he have reasonably predicted the danger to Miss Taylor?

He didn’t think so. The trebuchet had been firing reliably seaward, if with varying degrees of strength. Sir Lewis had said afterward he could not have replicated that trajectory if he tried. A freak accident, nothing more.