Page 55 of The Book of Lost Stories
‘Well, you can tell him to desist spying on me, now that you know my secret.’
‘Miss Weston, you can have no notion how difficult it is for an old soldier to get work, especially one wounded as this poor fellow is. He is blind in one eye, you know, and has lost the use of an arm.’
‘Then find him a job to do on your estate. You must surely be able to do that?’
‘And so I mean to do eventually. I will take him back north with me next time I go, for he might help the bailiff.’
‘We seem to have strayed from the subject in hand,’ she said coldly. ‘Pray tell me, sir, how you came to discover my authorship and, perhaps more importantly, what you mean to do with the information?’
‘I believe my suspicions were first aroused when it was drawn to my attention how closely the villain inThe Travails of Lady Malvinaresembled me: too closely for coincidence. It made me recall a certain letter of yours, one that you dropped at Knaresborough on the occasion of our unfortunate misunderstanding.’
‘A letter?’
‘It was addressed to your companion, Miss Grimshaw, I think. The seal was broken in our … struggle,’ he said, with a slight smile of reminiscence, which maddened her.
‘Youreadmy letter? That was hardly the action of a gentleman, although I suppose it might be expected of one who had just so grossly insulted me!’
‘I expect I deserved that, but I did afterwards send the letter on for you.’
‘Yes, after you read it!’ She only wished she could recall what she had said in it, but rather thought it had been a description of their first meeting and some very unflattering comments.
‘Haveyounever read a letter you were not meant to, Miss Weston?’ he said, turning his head.
‘No, of course—’ Then she broke off, flushing, for indeed she had on several occasions read Lady Crayling’s letters to Lady Basset. ‘That is beside the point: you must have known it was not meant for your eyes.’
‘Perhaps not, but although I have forgotten much of it, some of the lines are burned on to my memory for ever. Indeed, had that letter not made it so plain that you had taken me in unalterable dislike, then I believe that I must have sought you out on my return from London in order to abjectly seek your forgiveness for my behaviour.’
She felt her cheeks grow hot. ‘It is as well you did not, for my father would not have let you through the door. Not only did he have a profound dislike of my meeting young men, but he had already warned me before my departure for Harrogate to have nothing to do with you, should we meet.’
‘But why should he think that our paths would cross? It was pure chance that we met at all,’ he said, surprised.
‘We had heard that you had inherited Priory Chase, and Papa insisted that your father had been the means to ruining him.’
‘My father ruined him? Come, are you sure we are not straying into the convoluted plots of one of your novels, Miss Weston?’
‘No, we are not!’ she snapped. ‘I do not know all the circumstances, but I believe they served in the army together and were both great gamblers, and your father won Papa’s estate, by cheating, he said.’
Rayven frowned in an effort of memory. ‘I do seem to remember hearing something of that … but my father’s cousin, the last Lord Rayven, paid for my schooling after my mother died, so I never got to hear the ins and outs of it. But if he had any such winnings, then he lost them again almost immediately, for he never had a feather to fly with.’
‘Yes, so Papa said,’ she sighed. ‘And I dare say had Papa not lost the estate to your father at cards, it would have been to someone else.’
‘And it can hardly be held to be my fault, do you think?’ he pointed out gently.
‘I suppose not.’
‘And had I not been discouraged by your letter, Iwouldhave sought you out to apologize.’
‘So you say, but it still does not excuse your behaviour to me in Knaresborough.’
‘I was wrong, most grievously wrong. But tell me, Miss Weston, must Ialwaysbe the villain of the piece?’
Looking up, she saw that he had turned his head again and was looking at her with a very serious expression in his dark blue eyes.
‘N-no, I have come to perceive that people in real life are never as black and white as they may seem and appearances are not a true indicator of character.’
‘Then there is hope that I might redeem myself in your eyes? I assure you, I very much desire to do so.’
‘If you keep the secret of my authorship, then indeed I will be ready to admit that you are not quite as bad as I once thought,’ she admitted, hoping he did not read more of her novels and so discover that inRavish’d by Cruel Fate, the villain somehow managed to turn into the hero and vice versa, a troubling tendency that seemed to be recurring inDeath or Dishonour.
