Secluded with the Rogue

20. Twenty

Twenty

C HRYSTABEL PASSED the slipper beneath her skirts to Lord Trentingham, wondering what Creath was telling Joseph. She wished she were as confident in her plan as she’d led him to believe.

What if she were wrong? What if Matthew hadn’t quite fallen in love with Creath yet, or what if he had but was too cautious to tie the knot quickly? When she’d mentioned marriage yesterday, he’d dismissed the notion out of hand.

Or what if Matthew loved Creath, but she didn’t love him back? Creath had run away when he’d kissed her, after all. Chrystabel was fairly certain she’d seen signs of love, but this was her first matchmaking endeavor.

Or worst of all, what if Creath loved Joseph and wanted to marry him regardless of whether there was another alternative? What if she rejected Matthew’s proposal and held Joseph to his promise?

She was so preoccupied with her worries that it took her a moment to react when Joseph stumbled back into the great room, closely followed by Creath.

“Sir Leonard’s on his way!” he hollered. “Half a mile distant at most!”

Icy fear gripped Chrystabel’s heart. Doom approaching. It felt like the Dragoons all over again.

“Why aren’t you in the priest hole?” Joseph looked to Creath as if he’d just noticed she’d trailed him into the chamber. “Go get in the priest hole!”

She shook her head wildly. “I-I can’t,” she gasped, looking terrified. “It was so dark I couldn’t breathe, I just?—”

“I’ll take a candle and go with her.” Matthew jumped up from the floor and grabbed Creath’s hand. “Let’s go!” As he pulled her from the room, he called over his shoulder, “Someone will need to follow us and close the false bottom over our heads.”

“We can’t let Sir Leonard see us celebrating Christmas!” Chrystabel rushed to the fireplace and began yanking down greenery. “Where can we hide all of this?”

“Mother, Father, stay here.” Joseph grabbed a couple of newsheets from a rack and tossed them to his parents. “When Sir Leonard shows up, he’ll find you passing a lazy winter morning in your great room. Lady Arabel, Chrystabel, we’ll collect all the trimmings and hide them in the priest hole.”

Arabel rushed off. Chrystabel pulled the last of the decorations from the great room and ran through the small sitting room, down the corridor, and into the bedchamber with the priest hole. Craning her neck over her armful of greenery, she saw the wardrobe cabinet’s doors were still open, the false bottom raised and still leaning against the side.

“Watch out below!” she called and tossed it all down the hole, hoping the trimmings weren’t falling on Matthew and Creath.

All the while, she marveled at Joseph’s ability to take charge during an emergency. He would make her an excellent husband, if only everything could work out.

When she turned around, Arabel shoved more decorations into her hands. Then Joseph showed up with yet more. “I fear Sir Leonard must be here by now,” he said.

“I’ll go check,” Arabel said and ran off again.

When Chrystabel went to fling more wreaths and garlands into the priest hole, Joseph held her back. “They might land on the stairs and create a hazard. Let me take them down. It’s safer.”

“We need to gather the rest!”

“This is the last of it. And I doubt Sir Leonard is here to catch us celebrating Christmas, anyway. He wants his bride.”

Below, Creath whimpered.

“I’m on my way,” Joseph called to her. His arms full of greenery, he began backing down the steep wooden staircase, his gaze on Chrystabel above. “Wait till I’m down, then toss me your decorations and follow. Watch the third step—it’s broken.”

Chrystabel leaned into the wardrobe cabinet and glimpsed a room far below. The dim light of Matthew’s candle flickered on walls made of stone. The chamber was surprisingly large for something called a priest hole, and sparsely furnished with a small wooden table, two hard chairs, and a tall, narrow bookshelf against one wall. And a bed. Well, a pallet, really—it didn’t have any bedclothing. She supposed a hiding priest couldn’t expect anything more comfortable.

Even with his arms full, Joseph descended the long staircase quickly. He disappeared for a moment before stepping back into her view. His hands were empty now. “I’m ready,” he called softly.

Chrystabel dropped the last of the decorations into the dimness and followed, avoiding the third step.

No sooner did she reach the bottom than Arabel arrived above. “He’s here! With an ancient priest-hunter, no less! He saw me, so I’m going back to pretend I’m passing the morning with Lord and Lady Trentingham.” With that, she slammed the false bottom into place over their heads.

Matthew’s candle blew out, leaving them in sudden darkness.

Creath whimpered again.

“Hush,” Chrystabel heard Matthew whisper. “It’s going to be all right. We will keep you safe.”

As Arabel banged the wardrobe doors closed above, Chrystabel imagined Matthew gathering Creath into his arms. She couldn’t see anything, so she didn’t know whether he’d done so. But she wished she could see Joseph’s reaction to Matthew comforting Creath. She was more certain than ever that her brother and Joseph’s friend belonged together.

Why had she doubted herself?

She wondered what Creath had told Joseph before they’d come running back into the great room. She wished she could get him alone to ask.

“Did you hear what Arabel said?” Creath’s whisper sounded panicked. “He brought a priest-hunter. A priest-hunter!”

“What’s a priest-hunter?” Chrystabel asked.

“In Queen Elizabeth’s time,” Joseph’s soft voice came disembodied through the dark, “priest-hunters?—”

“He’s going to find me!” Creath interrupted. “He’s going to find me and make me marry him!”

“Hush,” Matthew soothed again.

Someone in the priest hole moved—and a shuffling sound followed by a crash indicated whoever it was had stumbled over some decorations and fell.

“Ouch!” If it were possible to whisper a shout, Joseph had accomplished that. “Holy Hades,” he hissed in evident pain. “Chrystabel, could you get the decorations off the floor and stack them all in a corner somewhere? Creath, you must calm yourself.”

“He’s going to find me!”

“There’s a tunnel hidden behind the bookcase.” Joseph sounded somewhat exasperated. “The bookcase itself is a door with a hidden latch. I’m not sure which way I’m facing now, but stand away from the walls and I’ll find it.”

Shuffling around in the dark in search of the trimmings she’d tossed down willy-nilly, Chrystabel bumped into the table. Now she knew where she was—at least generally. She decided to work her way around the room in a pattern, gathering the wreaths and garlands while avoiding the walls, as Joseph had asked.

“You never told me there was a tunnel from here.” Creath’s whisper sounded muffled, as though her face might be buried against Matthew’s chest. “We used to play in here all the time, and I never knew.”

“I suspect there are things you haven’t told me, either,” Joseph murmured a little sourly. “Ah, here it is.”

Chrystabel heard a click and then the loud screech of a creaky door swinging open. She froze—as did everyone else, if she could judge by the sudden, total silence.

No footsteps sounded in the room above them.

“Creath, where are you?” Joseph called after a moment.

“Here.” The single word was a terrified whisper.

“Come toward my voice. Now, listen. I’m going to get you out of here, but I don’t want to talk once we leave this room, because I fear any words may echo in the tunnel and find their way out the other end. So here’s what we’re going to do…are you listening?”

“I’m listening.”

Chrystabel was listening, too—with her heart in her throat.

She heard Joseph draw a deep breath. “We won’t be able to stand up in the tunnel. We will have to crawl. I’ll lead the way and you’ll follow—stay close enough to touch me, all right? I want you to touch me every few moments, and if I don’t feel you I’ll slow down. We’ll come out in the well house near the stables, where no one will be able to see us emerge. The well’s water level is below the tunnel exit, and there are metal rungs sunk into the well wall, like a ladder we can climb.”

“Won’t the priest-hunter look in the well house?” asked Creath.

“If he does, we’ll hear him coming and go back down the well and into the tunnel. I’m more worried about him finding you here. This way if he finds this priest hole, you won’t be here—all he’ll find is the Trevors with a bunch of Christmas decorations. Do you understand everything I’ve told you so far?”

“I do.”

“Very well. We’ll stay inside the well house and keep quiet until we feel it’s safe to make a run for the stables. I’ll take you to Bristol and marry you, and that will be that. We no longer have any time to waste.”

Chrystabel gasped as her heart plunged from her throat to her knees.

He was going to marry Creath?

Now she knew Creath’s answer and wished she didn’t.

“On Christmas Day?” Her heart had to be in her throat again, because she could barely force the words out. She clutched the trimmings she was holding so hard that pine needles poked into her. “You think you can wed her on Christmas Day?”

“It’s officially not a holiday, remember?” Joseph sounded calm. Dead calm. Like maybe he was feeling dead inside. “All the shops are supposed to be open. All government officials have been ordered to mind their posts. Including Justices of the Peace. Yes, I think I can wed her on Christmas Day.”

“But—” Chrystabel began and stopped.

“But what?” he whispered.

She didn’t know what to say. So she didn’t say anything. And then she realized she wasn’t saying anything because there was nothing she could say. Nothing she could say that would stop Joseph from wedding Creath.

He’d promised to marry Creath, and he wouldn’t go back on his word, because he was an honorable man.

And Chrystabel wouldn’t want him any other way.

His decency was one of the many reasons she loved him.

More needles were poking into her, and the chocolate she’d enjoyed earlier was threatening to come back up.

Joseph apparently gave up waiting for her to answer. Chrystabel heard a rustling noise.

“Creath, do you feel that?” Joseph’s voice still sounded dead. “It’s my surcoat—have you got it? I don’t want you freezing on the ride to Bristol. Put it on now. Once we make a run for the stables, we won’t have time to do anything but jump on two horses. We’ll need to be well gone before they realize what’s happened and try to follow us.”

“All right.” Creath sounded petrified, but she obeyed. Chrystabel heard more rustling as she donned the surcoat. “It’s too big on me.”

“It will keep you warm.”

“Won’t you be cold?”

“Don’t worry about me,” Joseph said. “Are you ready?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then let’s go. Grosmont, close the bookcase door very slowly behind us. Hopefully that will make less noise.”

“No,” came Matthew’s voice.

“What? You don’t think it will make less noise?”

“I don’t think you should go with her. I will go with her, and you can close the damned bookcase.”

A stunned silence filled the dark room.

“Creath,” Joseph finally whispered, “when I asked you?—”

“I must go ,” she whispered back fiercely. “Before they find me. Come on, Matthew—you lead.”