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“Oh, my dear. What have you done?”
Chapter 8
Violent Hands
I am the Resurrection and the life, saith the Lord. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in me, shall never die.
Well, he hoped so, to be sure. The words hadn’t yet been spoken, but repeated themselves in his mind, a comforting refrain. Though another bit from the Book of Common Prayer whispered a counterpoint in the background.
…not to be used for any that die unbaptized, or excommunicate, or have laid violent hands upon themselves.
He hadn’t gone to his father’s funeral—didn’t know if there had been one.
In spite of the weather, the church was full. The Dunsanys were liked by their tenants, friendly with most of the country gentry, and kind to their servants; everyone wished to comfort the family in its grief. Besides, it was the country, and entertainment was rare; no one would miss a good funeral, even if they were obliged to tramp through waist-deep snow to attend it.
Grey glanced over his shoulder, to see whether the tall figure of Jamie Fraser loomed among the crowd of grooms and chambermaids who stood at the back of the church, but there was no sign of the Scot. Fraser was, of course, forbidden to leave the boundaries of Helwater, but surely he would have been given leave to attend the funeral with the other servants—if he wished to.
Grey still felt the chill of his night watch in the chapel in his bones, but this deepened as he heard the rustle of anticipation at the door, and turned with everyone else to see the coffin of Ludovic, eighth Earl of Ellesmere, being brought in.
He made no attempt not to stare. Everyone was staring. The minister had come forth, and was waiting, stone-faced, at the altar, where Geneva’s coffin already stood. Grey himself had helped to carry that, dreadfully conscious of the silent weight within.
What was causing his bones to freeze within him now, though, was the sight of Jamie Fraser, tall and grim, serving as pallbearer with five other sturdy manservants.
Someone had given him coat and breeches of a cheap black worsted, very ill-fitting. He should have looked ridiculous, bony wrists protruding from the too-short sleeves, and every seam strained to bursting. As it was, he reminded Grey of a description he had read in Demonologie,a nasty little treatise discovered in the course of researches undertaken after his experience with the Hellfire Club.
The men set down the earl’s coffin and retreated to a bench set under the gallery. Grey was not surprised in the least to see Fraser sitting alone at one end, the other men bunched unconsciously together, as far away from him as they could get.
The vicar cleared his throat with an ominous rumble, the congregation rose, flustered and murmuring, and the service began. Grey heard not a word, his responses entirely mechanical.
Could he be right? He went back and forth on the matter, unsure. On the one hand, the thought that had come to him in the darkness of the chapel seemed incredible. A complete delusion, born of grief, fatigue, and shock. On the other…there was Lady Dunsany’s behavior. Grief-stricken, certainly, but grief covering a rocklike determination. Determination to put the past behind her and raise her grandchild? Or determination to perpetrate a daring deception in order to protect him?
And Lord Dunsany, the target of his own blame—and his wife’s. For arranging the marriage with Ellesmere, he’d said…but also for allowing Geneva too much freedom. What the devil had he said, mumbling in his cups? Something about her horse, spending hours roaming the countryside, alone on her horse. Not alone, surely. In the company of her groom,said a cynical voice in his mind.
And then there was said groom himself, and that remarkable encounter in the middle of the night. Even though Grey had not slept, it still seemed the product of a dream. He turned deliberately in his seat and looked at Fraser. Nothing whatever showed on the Scot’s face. He might have been looking back at Grey—or at something a thousand miles beyond him.
Isobel was seated next to Grey, her small, cold, black-gloved hand held in his for support. She was no longer weeping; he thought she had simply passed the point of being able to.
Not a one of the Dunsany family had so much as glanced at Fraser, though most of the congregation had gawked openly, and many were still darting looks at him where he sat on the bench, upright and menacing as a corpse candle.
Yes, there was evidence. But his knowledge of James Fraser was evidence, as well—and he found it inconceivable that Fraser could or would have seduced a young girl, no matter what the circumstances. Let alone the daughter of his employer.
His eyes settled on the pair of coffins at the front of the church, identical beneath their white shrouds. So tragic, so…solidly marital.
Yes, and you bloody knew Geneva, too,he thought.
The rain had turned to snow. It wouldn’t stick, sodden as the ground was, but the wind drove it against the windows, bursts of hard, dry pellets that struck the glass like bird shot.
Snowflake upon snowflake, silently accumulating into a drift of what seemed like certainty—but, he reminded himself, could as easily be pure illusion.
He was light-headed from lack of sleep, and the snow-darkened windows lent the church a mournful dimness. He’d sat through the predawn hours in the freezing chapel, watching the flicker of the candle flames, and thinking.
Was his refusal to believe it purely the product of his own pride, his own guilt? Not only his belief in Jamie Fraser’s honor, a refusal to believe he could be so mistaken in the man—but the knowledge that if it weretrue, he himself must bear a good part of the blame. He had introduced Fraser into the Dunsany household, his own honor surety for Fraser’s.
He hadn’t eaten this morning, too chilled and exhausted to think of food after his vigil in the chapel.
“Out of the deep have I called unto thee, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice.”
Fraser had closed his eyes, quite suddenly, as though unable to bear what he saw. What didhe see? Grey wondered. The Scot’s face remained blank as granite, but he saw the big hands curl slowly, gathering fabric and flesh together, fingers digging so hard into the muscle of his thigh that they must leave bruises.
Was it Geneva he mourned—or his dead wife? The trouble with funerals was that they reminded one of loss. He had not seen his father’s funeral, and yet had never sat through one without thought of his father, the wound of his loss healing, growing smaller through the years, but always reopened.
And if ever I saw a man bleeding internally…he thought, watching Fraser.
“Give courage and faith to those who are bereaved, that they may have strength to meet the days ahead in the comfort of a reasonable and holy hope, in the joyful expectation of eternal life with those they love.”
Well, that expectation would be a comfort, to be sure. He had no such expectation himself—only something too vague to be called hope—but he did have one certainty to anchor himself in this fog of grief and indecision. The certainty that he would get at least one answer from Jamie Fraser. Maybe two.