A Stroke of Malice (Lady Darby Mystery #8) - Anna Lee Huber Page 0,64

a glance at me out of the corner of his eye. “Said he had a weak heart. Apparently, it runs in the family, for after Father, Grandmama lost two children the same way.”

I didn’t know what to say to this, so I said nothing. But his words pressed heavy on my heart. To lose a child was a horrible thing, though I knew it happened every day, every hour. Sickness alone carried away so many precious little ones. How many had been lost to the cholera just in the short weeks since it had arrived in Edinburgh? Dozens? Hundreds?

I wrapped an arm around my abdomen, as if I could shield my child, though I knew I couldn’t. Not completely. Because diseases did not care what class you were, or how much money you possessed, or whether you were kind or hateful. They infected indiscriminately.

I had been nervous about becoming a mother, about how I would balance our sometimes dangerous inquiries, my portrait painting, and a child. But now that I could feel the child inside me, I had become attached to his or her presence, and the thought of them no longer being with me stole the breath from my lungs.

Inside my cloak, my hand rubbed soothing circles over my stomach as I forced myself to take deep, even breaths. I thought of the duchess, of the pain and disillusionment she hid behind her gaiety and insouciance. Evidently baby George had been the duke’s son, and the last child they had together before she took other men to her bed. It cast a new light on why she had done so.

As uncertain as I felt about some of her behavior, there was one thing I could say with confidence. The Duchess of Bowmont was a good mother. It was evident in the way her children spoke of her, in the way she interacted with them, and in the manner she rushed to their aid or spoke in their defense when necessary.

But such a fact also generated an inherent conflict. For what would she not do for her children? What would she not lie about?

I wasn’t certain I could fault her for that. But I was certain I couldn’t trust her. Not in this investigation. Not entirely.

A hand brushed against my back, and I turned to find Gage gazing down at me in concern, his pale lashes speckled with snow. “Shall we return?”

“Not through the tunnel,” I insisted, despite the fact that it might be dryer and warmer to be sheltered from the wind buffeting us.

His lips quirked as he apprehended, perhaps for the first time, how anxious that dark, enclosed space underground had made me. “There must be a path leading back to the castle.” He looked to Lord Edward for confirmation.

If he was unhappy to be forced to make a trek through the cold, swirling snow, he was gentlemanly enough not to show it. “Indeed. Follow me.”

Gage guided me forward, his steadying hand pressed against my back. The others fell into step beside us as we passed.

“Thank heavens,” Trevor grumbled, stamping his feet. “If we’d had to traipse back through that bloody tunnel, I might have done someone an injury.”

I smiled at my brother, not having realized he’d been as unnerved as I was. “I wondered why you were so quiet.”

“Yes, well, it isn’t very manly to admit that rats make you want to shriek.”

“You could have blamed it on me,” I told him. “I wouldn’t have denied it.”

The look he cast my way clearly expressed what he thought of the idea of casting blame on his little sister for his fright.

“Well, then, what of Friar Thatch?” I amended, suddenly feeling impish. “He is rumored to haunt that passage. Perhaps he’s known to shriek as well.”

Trevor shook his head. “I’m not even going to respond to that.”

I smiled as he lengthened his stride to outpace us.

* * *

* * *

Dinner that evening was anything but festive. Not only were people noticeably still recovering from their excesses the night before, but all anyone wished to discuss was the body found in the crypt. Well, that and the weather, but for once that topic was less a polite conversational gambit and more an expression of anxiety. Those older servants, who were inclined to know, predicted that the snow flurries of the afternoon were but a herald of what was to come. It appeared the idea of being confined by the weather, even to a palatial ducal estate, was not in the