One Night for Love

His mind for some reason stuck on that idea. Perhaps because there were no other ideas.

Was it likely that Bessie Doyle would have burned the contents of that pack without sifting through them first? If there had been anything of value, would she not have kept it? Had she kept something apart from the bag itself? She seemed a woman of open enough honesty, though. He had not been given the impression that she was hiding anything—he still did not believe it.

She had been away from home when the pack arrived. Presumably her husband had received it. He had died in an accident before she returned home, leaving the pack and its contents spilled all over the floor in one corner of the cottage.

Almost as if he—or someone else—had been searching for something.

Without understanding the reason, Neville felt chilled and uneasy.

Sergeant Doyle had been trying to tell him something before his death. Something he ought to have told Lily and someone else. Something about the pack he had left back at the base. He had repeatedly told Lily that there was something inside it for her. Was it possible that William Doyle had found whatever it was?

And had been killed as a result?

But there was no way now of discovering the answers.

This was ridiculous, Neville thought impatiently. He would be writing Gothic novels before he was finished. But then the idea of three attempts being made on Lily's life was ridiculous too.

And then a memory popped into his head as if from nowhere—a detail he had not paid much attention to at the time. A letter had come, Bessie Doyle had told him, informing them of Sergeant Doyle's death. And William, who could not read, had taken the letter to the vicar to read to him. If the pack itself had contained a letter or a package with some writing, would he have taken that too to the vicar?

This was ridiculous stuff, Neville thought again.

Someone wanted Lily dead. Nothing was more senseless than that. But somehow, somewhere, there must be a reason for it.

He knew then what he was going to have to do.

He closed his hand more protectively about Lily's.

He was going to save her. If it cost him his life, if it cost him her, he would save her from terror and death. He would not stop looking until he found and destroyed whatever—or whoever—was threatening her.

Chapter 23

Lily was feeling depressed. Neville had made a quick recovery after coming out of his fever, as might have been expected of a seasoned soldier, and had returned to Kilbourne House two days later. He had called the day after that, but only briefly to announce that he was leaving town for a few days. He had not explained either where he was going or when he expected to return—if he ever did. His manner had been abrupt and impersonal, though he had taken Lily's hands in his when he took his leave. Elizabeth had been in the room too.

'Lily,' he had said, 'you will promise me, if you please, not to leave this house alone and not to leave any room in a house other than this without company.'

He had waited for her answer. It had not seemed an appropriate moment to assert her independence. Anyway, she would have done as he suggested even if he had not asked it of her.

'I promise.'

He had squeezed her hands, hesitated a moment, and then said more. 'When you do leave this house,' he had told her, 'you may sense that you are being watched and followed. You must not be alarmed even though you will be right. There will be more than one of them—watching out for your safety.'

Her eyes had widened, but she had not argued. It was no longer possible to persuade herself that she had been imagining any of the attacks on her life. And he had earned the right—with a bullet in his shoulder—to show an active concern for her safety.

She had nodded again and he had left after squeezing her hands once more and bending toward her to place one light kiss on her cheek.

Since then she had gone driving in the park twice at the fashionable hour with Elizabeth and the Duke of Portfrey, and she had been to one private dinner at the Duke of Anburey's and one select soiree at the home of one of Elizabeth's friends—a lady with a reputation as a bluestocking. And her lessons had resumed.

She had thrown herself into her studies with a frenzy of energy and determination. At last she seemed to have passed a frustrating plateau and could see progress again in almost all skills except embroidery.

But she was depressed. No progress had been made in apprehending the man who had tried on three separate occasions to kill her. She had kept quiet about her own groundless suspicions. There were no clues, no leads. But in the meantime she felt as if she lived in a cage. She could go nowhere alone even though the weather had been uniformly glorious and the early mornings had beckoned her with an almost irresistible invitation. And even when she was from home she felt the presence of her guards.

Her nerves were feeling frayed. Elizabeth had mentioned quite casually that she was glad to have learned that Lauren was going to her grandfather's in Yorkshire. A change of scene would be good for her.

When had she left?

'Did Gwendoline go with her?' Lily had asked.

But Lauren had intended going alone. Had she really gone to Yorkshire? Lily could not help asking herself. But it was absurd. Lauren, though she rode, was not the type to gallop astride across the open stretches of Hyde Park. And one could not somehow imagine her aiming and firing a pistol. Or thrusting a rock from its moorings on top of a cliff. But even so…

Worst of all, Neville was gone—just at the time when Lily had thought there was a new courtship between