The Shadow of Sin (Bantam Series No. 19) Read online

  There was a pale moon and she could see the world outside bathed in a silver light.

  It was very hot and she had a sudden longing for air.

  She turned back into her room and put on a cotton wrapper which Nana had made for her to wear in the summer over her thin lawn night-gowns.

  She tied the sash of it round her slim waist and, putting on a pair of slippers, opened the door of her room very carefully.

  The house was very quiet.

  She expected to hear Giles snoring as she had heard him the night before, but there was no sound from his room and to her surprise she saw his door was open.

  ‘He must be downstairs in the Sitting-Room,’ she thought, and guessed he had been too drunk to get to bed.

  Very quietly Celesta slipped down the stairs.

  The Sitting-Room door was shut and she let herself out through the back entrance.

  In the garden there was the scent of stocks and roses.

  As she moved towards the shrubbery she heard the rustle of small animals in the under-growth and an owl hooted far away in the distance.

  Celesta had the idea that if she could walk about, her problems would not seem as insistent as they had when she was lying in her bed.

  Was she doing the right thing in going away?

  To stay would mean that Giles would force her to marry Lord Crawthorne and she had known from the very beginning that this was impossible.

  She had not been exaggerating when she had told Giles that she would rather die than marry him.

  It was the truth.

  She walked to the edge of the shrubbery and saw King ahead of her the Priory in all its beauty.

  The moonlight revealed its Elizabethan roofs and twisted chimney stacks and glittered on the diamond-paned windows.

  It was very beautiful. Celesta had always felt even as a child that it still had a spiritual, almost holy atmosphere about it, as if the influence created by the monks had never been erased by time.

  It had been her home and now it belonged to the man she loved.

  She wondered how soon the Earl would bring Lady Imogen there and remembered how she had said what a perfect place it would be for a fancy-dress Ball.

  “I might go as the family ghost!” Lady Imogen had laughed. “I am sure there is one!”

  Celesta had the uncanny feeling that she was in fact a ghost haunting the Priory.

  Perhaps because she was there in spirit the Earl would sometimes remember her.

  It was so painful to think of him and know that he was sleeping in the Master Bed-Room that Celesta turned from looking at the house and moved away.

  She walked along a mossy path to where the shrubbery joined the pine-wood which encircled the back of the house, protecting it from the North-East winds that at times blew fiercely from the sea.

  Her footsteps made no sound as she moved through the trees, drawing nearer to the house, while at the same time it was out of her sight.

  Then as she walked along, deep in her thoughts, suddenly she heard someone speaking.

  She stopped still, realised that it was a man’s voice and he was somewhere just ahead of her.

  She wondered who it could be.

  When her father was alive she would have expected it would be a Game-Keeper either hunting vermin or watching for poachers.

  But the Game-Keepers had all been dismissed, and she knew that if the Earl had engaged new ones it would have been talked about in the village.

  “Why then,” she asked herself, “should there be men in the woods at this time of night?”

  Curious and hidden by the branches of the trees, she moved on.

  Peeping through the thick leaves of a rhododendron bush, she saw two men sitting on the ground at the foot of a tall fir-tree.

  There was a small clearing and the ground was sandy beneath the firs.

  Celesta knew beyond it there was a path which led from there directly to the back of the Priory.

  “Wot’s th’time?” one of the men was asking.

  Now she could see that they were rough and uncouth men with handkerchiefs round their necks and felt hats pulled low over their eyes.

  The man who had spoken had a cockney accent.

  In answer his companion pulled a watch from his pocket.

  “ ’Tis nigh on twenty past,” he answered. “Us goes in ’nother two minutes as ’is Nibs told we.”

  “What’ll us do if anyun sees we?” the first man asked and there was a nervous note in his voice.

  “ ’Ow can us be seen if us goes up the secret passage?” the older man replied. “ ’E’s told Oi exactly where it is and once we’re inside we’re safe.”

  “I ’opes ye’re right!”

  “Now all ye ’as to do, Sam, is wot ye’re been told. Ye goes first—stabs ’im if ’e be asleep an’ only if ’e fights ye, do Oi shoot ’im.”

  “Oi knows! Oi knows!” the younger man said, “and then us nips back down the passage an back ’ere.”

  “Where ’is Nibs’ll be awaiting with th’ money—make no mistake abaht that Gold, Sam! And that’s what us both wants.”

  As he spoke the older man got to his feet.

  “Cum on now! An’ whatever ’appens, don’t panic!”

  “ ’Tis all right for ye to say that,” Sam whined, “but Oi’ve got to stab ’im, an’ wot’ll Oi do if ’e ain’t asleep?”

  “Cum on!” was the answer, and the two men moved through the trees towards the house.

  Celesta stood as if turned to stone.

  Now she understood!

  Now she knew what Giles had meant when he had said:

  “It would be easier to prove the Earl had broken the rules of the game if he was not there.”

  Then she remembered something else; remembered Lord Crawthorne saying in that slimy, silky voice:

  “The Earl is a very rich man and let us hope for Lady Imogen’s sake he lives to enjoy it!”

  She knew what was being planned.

  She knew why Giles and Lord Crawthorne had whispered together in the Sitting-Room and her brother had been so sure that he would be able to get the Priory back into his possession.

  Giles would be a murderer!

  She could hardly credit the truth that he had instigated the crime that was about to be committed.

  No-one else except for herself and the Earl knew of the secret passage which led directly into the Master Bed-Room.

  The thought of the men she had just seen creeping up to the Earl to stab him while he slept galvanised Celesta into action.

  She turned and ran back a little way down the path by which she had come. Then when she was opposite the front of the house she sped through the garden towards the Priory.

  She crossed the herb-garden and ran on through the roses and down the long grass walk where her mother had planted herbaceous borders.

  She was almost breathless with the speed at which she had run by the time she came to the garden door which had been her usual exit from the house when she had lived at the Priory.

  The door would be locked. His Lordship’s servants

  would have seen to that. But the catch on the casement window on one side of it had been broken for years and no-one had ever bothered to have it repaired.

  Celesta pulled at the lead window-frame and, as she expected, it opened quite easily.

  It took her only a second to slip over the windowsill and into the house.

  Then because it was all so familiar to her she ran, almost as quickly as she had run through the garden, along the passages and up the twisting old stairway which led to the first floor.

  The Master Bed-Room was still some distance from the landing which opened on to the main staircase, and Celesta was frightened that the men might move quicker than she could, and anyway they had less distance to go.

  The house was very quiet save for the tick of a grandfather clock in the Hall, and if there was a night-watchman there was no sign of him.

  She reached the door of the Ma
ster-Suite and without knocking opened it.

  The room was not in darkness because the Earl on going to bed had pulled back the curtains from one of the windows.

  The casement was wide open and the moonlight cast a pool of silver light on the worn red carpet.

  The big oak four-poster bed was in shadow and as Celesta moved towards it she could see the Earl’s dark head on the pillow and knew he was asleep.

  She realised then how vulnerable he was; how easy it would be for her if she had a dagger in her hand, while he was unconscious.

  She bent over him and put her hand on his shoulder.

  “My Lord!” she whispered.

  He woke instantly, like a man who has served in the Army and is used to being on the alert.

  “What is it?” he began.

  Then he exclaimed incredulously:

  “Celesta! Why are you here?”

  “There are two men,” she answered quickly. “They are coming up the secret passage to kill you!”

  The Earl sat up abruptly.

  “What are you talking about?”

  He kept his voice low, as if the urgency in hers had made him aware that she was not speaking lightly.

  “The first man carries a dagger, the second a pistol!” she said. “But only if you cannot be stabbed to death will they use the pistol.”

  The Earl got out of bed and reached for his robe, which lay on a chair.

  He put it on over his night-shirt. Being dark in colour it made him less conspicuous.

  “Have you a pistol?” Celesta whispered.

  “No. I can manage without one.”

  He looked round the room as if, she thought, for a weapon but instead he took her by the hand to a chest of drawers that was set across one corner.

  “Get behind it,” he said. “Crouch down and do not show yourself.”

  She obeyed him without argument.

  Then raising her eyes just above the top of the chest she watched him move swiftly across the room towards the fireplace.

  The panel into the Priests’ hole at the top of the secret passage was on the right of the hearth and she wondered what the Earl was about to do.

  He bent down and picked up a heavy iron poker which lay in the grate.

  He flattened himself against the wall just by the entrance to the secret passage.

  For a moment there was absolute silence and then Celesta heard the very faint click of the catch which opened the door in the panelling.

  It moved open so smoothly that had the Earl been asleep, as he had been when she entered the room, it would not have disturbed him.

  Now the head of the first man appeared and he stepped into the room.

  He moved so silently that Celesta watching him was certain that he must be an experienced robber and perhaps murderer.

  Now as he moved slowly across the floor towards the bed the other man appeared behind him.

  The Earl waited until they were both clear of the door and then he struck.

  He brought the iron poker down with all his strength on the head of the man carrying the pistol and he dropped like a log to the floor.

  Sam turned round and Celesta gave a little scream as she saw the dagger glitter in the moonlight.

  He had no chance to use it for the Earl gave him an upper-cut on the chin which lifted him off the ground to fall with a crash, striking his head against the oak bed-post before he touched the floor.

  “That disposes of them!” the Earl said in his normal voice.

  As he spoke he bent down to take the pistol from the hand of the man lying completely unconscious from the blow to his head and the dagger from the side of Sam.

  Celesta rose behind the chest of drawers and now as he stood in the moonlight, she could see that the Earl was smiling.

  He put out his hand.

  “Come!” he said. “I must get you away from here before I raise the alarm.”

  She moved towards him and he put his arm round her as if to protect her from the men lying on the floor.

  She was trembling and he said gently:

  “It is all right! There is nothing to fear and you have saved my life.”

  She could not answer because now that the danger was over she was no longer afraid but was trembling because he was close to her, and his arm was round her shoulders.

  Still holding her closely, the Earl shut the door of the secret passage and opened the one onto the landing.

  “No-one saw you come here?” he asked.

  “N-no,” she answered and found it hard to recognise her own voice, it was so unsteady.

  “How did you know they were coming to kill me?”

  “I heard them talking in the woods.”

  “Why were you in the woods?”

  “I could not sleep.”

  “That was fortunate for me!” he said.

  He led her along the landing and when they reached the door of the main staircase he asked:

  “Did you come up this way?”

  “No,” she answered, “I came in by the garden door. There is a catch broken on one of the windows.”

  “Then you had better leave the same way,” he said, “then I will wake my House-Hold.”

  They went downstairs side by side.

  When they reached the garden door the Earl saw the open window. He threw back the bolts and turned the key in the lock.

  Then he looked at Celesta.

  She was very lovely and ethereal with her fair hair falling over her shoulders.

  “Do I really have to say ‘thank you’ to you for saving my life?”

  She looked up at him thinking that with his hair a little tousled and without his high cravat he looked younger and less awe-inspiring.

  “What have you done to yourself?” he asked suddenly.

  She realised that he must be able to see in the moonlight the dark shadows under her eyes.

  “I ... cannot tell you ... now,” she answered.

  “You can tell me later today,” he told her. “There is nothing to worry about and we have plans to make.”

  His voice seemed to die away and then as if he could not help himself he drew her close.

  Her face was upturned to his and now, as if neither of them could prevent it, their lips met.

  It was a kiss as smooth and gentle as the moonlight touching the water.

  Then as Celesta’s lips clung to his she felt a flame arise within her and knew that the Earl felt the same.

  His lips became insistent, demanding, passionate, and Celesta felt the rapture of his closeness sweep away all thought of everything except that once again she must surrender herself to the wonder of her love.

  “I love you!” she wanted to say but it was impossible to speak.

  Then almost before she realised what was happening he had put her outside the door.

  “Go home, my darling,” he said. “I cannot have you involved in this mess.”

  The door shut and Celesta heard him slip the bolts home.

  For a moment she could not move but only feel something very precious and wonderful had happened to her.

  Then she started to run back the way she had come, past the herbaceous border, the roses, the herb-garden, until she was once again in the wood, in the shadow of the trees.

  She reached the path on which she had walked until she had heard the men talking.

  Just for a moment she hesitated and then she knew, even though she was sure it was Giles who had given the men their instructions, that she must make certain.

  Could he really be waiting for them as they had said, to give them their money?

  Blood money!

  Money stained with the blood of the man they were to murder as he slept!

  Because the Earl had escaped death she felt suddenly strong and no longer afraid.

  She would confront Giles.

  She would tell him what she thought of his despicable action and she would tell him too that after what he had tried to do she was free of him and she would never,
whatever he might say to her, marry Lord Crawthorne.

  She reached the clearing where the men had been sitting when she had listened to their conversation. For a moment she thought it was empty.

  Then lying on the sand she saw a figure—the figure of a man.

  For a moment she could hardly comprehend that it was not some trick of her imagination.

  Then she knew that it was Giles who lay there. She was certain even before she reached his side that he was dead!

  Chapter Eight

  Celesta dropped down on her knees beside her brother and saw in the moonlight the blood seeping through his coat in a dark crimson stain.

  He had been shot and she knew even before she touched his forehead that her first intuition had been correct and he was dead!

  The way he lay sprawled on the sandy ground told her that he must have fallen as the bullet hit him.

  Then in the moonlight she saw that his hand was out-stretched and his first finger was pointing towards some figures in the sand.

  She stared at them incredulously.

  Written clearly so that there was no mistaking the words she read:

  MELTHAM KILLED ME

  The last e trailed away as if it had been an effort on the part of the dying man, but the Meltham was written clearly and strongly.

  Kneeling beside Giles, Celesta stared at the words.

  Then she realised, as if someone told her in so many words, what had occurred, who was responsible not only for the writing in the sand but for Giles’s death.

  One thing was quite obvious. It would have been impossible for the Earl, whom she had found asleep in the Priory, to have murdered anyone and returned to his bed before the assailants reached him through the secret passage.

  Giles had therefore been killed while he waited for the men to return to receive gold for the crime he had instigated.

  Only Lord Crawthorne would benefit by Giles’s death and only Lord Crawthorne would, by the Earl’s death, be revenged for the manner in which he had insulted him.

  The whole plot seemed to unfold itself before Celesta.

  Then bending forward she rubbed out with her hand the incriminating words written in the sand.

  There was nothing she could do for Giles except to murmur a prayer that he would rest in peace.