Page 37 of The Marquess of Temptation
When she reached the entrance hall, the front door was open. She could see the sun shining outside and longed for some fresh air, to help her breathing, which was coming in short, sharp bursts.
That scoundrel, she thought furiously, as she tripped lightly down the wide steps onto the driveway. That blackguard; he promised that he would help me find the man who had killed my father and then he hid the perpetrator's identity from me purposefully.
She thought back to the previous night, when she had asked Alex solemnly to share her bed, and bile rose in her throat. Thank goodness he had refused, or she would surely have run him through with a sword, now that she knew what a lying, deceitful prig he had turned out to be.
Hestia was so furious that she was near running, and soon she had reached the end of the pebbled driveway. Thinking that she would walk into St Jarvis, and call on Jane, she walked out the wrought-iron gates and onto the country road which led to the town. She had been walking for no more than five minutes, when a farmer on a cart stopped to offer her a lift.
"Thank you, sir," she said gratefully, accepting his gnarled hand and sitting up beside him. "Are you going toward St Jarvis, by any chance?"
"I'll pass near enough, my love," the man said, with a wizened smile, "Thoughs I'll be staying on the main road to Truro."
"Oh. Perhaps I could beg a lift all the way there then, if it would not be too much trouble, sir?" Hestia replied impulsively. The urge to return home was overwhelming; she could not stay in Pemberton and look her husband in the eye, when she knew him to be such a cad. Truro was home, and Rose Cottage, though no doubt cold and damp, was hers.
"It's no trouble at all, Miss," the farmer replied jovially, flicking the reins so that the old-cart horse took off at a snail's pace, "In fact, I like having company on long drives. Tell me this; do you know much about growing turnips?"
"Nothing at all, sir," Hestia replied truthfully.
By the time they reached Truro, late that evening, just as darkness was falling, Hestia could have written an encyclopedia on the growing of root vegetables. She waved the farmer and his cart full of turnips goodbye under the watchful spires of St Mary's. He was headed west, toward Market Square, where he would sell his wares the next morning, whilst Hestia was going eastward toward home.
She made her way down the winding streets, past houses, which stood huddled atop each other, then cottages which stood apart, until finally she was walking along the familiar country lane, which would take her home. The last traces of light had just left the sky when she arrived at the gate of Rose Cottage. Her earlier anger at Alex had wiped any sensible thoughts from her mind, for she suddenly realised that she had no food, or even kindling to light a fire.
I feel as though there's something else I have forgotten, she thought idly, as she pushed the wooden door of the house open.
Henry!
A stab of guilt pierced her heart at the thought of poor, loyal Henry, whom she had left in her bed-chamber in Pemberton. Mind you, she had left him sleeping snugly upon her bed, and she knew that the spoiled little Cavalier would have detested the long journey from St Jarvis. Despite knowing that he would be most unappreciative of the plain cottage, Hestia rather wished that the little dog was there with her, as she grappled around in the dark for a tinder box and a candle. The shadows of the house felt unfamiliar, as though objects had been moved about since she had last lived there. She finally found a tinder box and the small stub of a candle, in the dresser by the kitchen window. The sense of relief she felt as the small flame threw much needed light into the darkness, was almost palpable.
She began to explore the small room, which acted as both a kitchen and sitting room, hoping to find some sticks, so that she could light a fire to throw off the cold night's air, that seemed to have permeated her very bones. She found a few, miserable twigs and set them aflame in the grate, hoping that the breeze which blew down the chimney, wouldn't extinguish them before the flames took hold.
She settled down in her mother's old chair, hoping to rest her bones, but her mind, which was usually quite practical, began to take fanciful notions, as noises from outside sent her heart racing. Ghosts are not real, she told herself, as the trees in the garden rustled in the wind. There was nothing to be afraid of, this was her home. Nothing could hurt her here; in fact nothing could hurt her as much as Alex's awful betrayal, which stung like a lash across her soul.
A particularly loud bang from the back garden caused Hestia to jump, her palms sweaty with fear. Whatever had made that noise, it was most certainly not the wind.
A fox, she thought, taking the fire poker in hand and peering out the window, or perhaps a badger. Instead of an animal, however, what she saw outside in the garden by the rockery, was a blonde haired man, who was swaying on his feet in the moonlight.
Her Uncle, Viscount Havisham.
Hestia clutched her shawl around herself and stepped out the back door into the cool night.
"Uncle," she called, her whispered voice echoing through the darkness. "Whatever are you doing?"
Havisham turned at the sound of his niece's voice, the muscles of his face slack from inebriation.
"Georgina," he slurred, as he caught sight of Hestia walking across the grass. "You're alive."
Hestia remembered, too late, the titbit of gossip that Jane had shared from London; that the Viscount Havisham had taken to the whiskey with gusto. He seemed more than drunk to her; his pale blue eyes were almost unseeing, and his mind seemed not quite right.
"I am Hestia, Uncle," she whispered uncertainly, coming to a halt a few yards away from where the drunkard stood swaying. "Georgina is gone. You came to visit just after she had died. Surely you remember?"
"She did not die," her Uncle whispered hoarsely, his face gaunt and pale. "She was murdered by that blackguard Stockbow."
"It was a low fever, which took her, Uncle," Hestia replied, taking a step back from the Viscount, whose dead eyes were beginning to unnerve her. "She was not murdered."
"She was," Havisham growled, his brow creasing in anger. "That pirate stole her from her home and murdered her. He took her from us and consigned her to a life of poverty, but I had my revenge on him."
I know what you stole Stockbow...
The words of the letter that her father had received, danced before her eyes, and a chill gripped her as she realised what his words meant.
