“That she was furious with the lout and didn’t want him to find them,” he grumbled.
Lydia held up another tome. “This one was written by her sister and was written at a later date.”
“The sister she left the manuscripts to?” Gerard squeezed Iona’s hand.
Now, she could sense his excitement taking over.
“The sister who understood the prophesies, yes.” Lydia read the passages where the younger woman described moving the precious but dangerous manuscripts to her sister’s burial vault in the newly-constructed chapel.
“We can probably find that.” Max lumbered to his feet.
Lydia pulled him back down and waited expectantly.
“Does the sister say who she meant to have those books?” Gerard stroked Iona’s hand as he spoke. She didn’t recognize the scent surrounding him but she thought it might be hope. “Or did she mean to leave them buried?”
Lydia flipped a few pages. “She was quite angry with her brother-in-law, who never learned to read.” She shot a knowing look at her husband. “He apparently remarried soon after his wife’s death but refused to send his sister-in-law back to Wystan as she asked. Her ability to read and write was too valuable.”
Iona leaned forward. “So the sister died here too? And the knowledge of the books went with her?”
“Until now,” Lydia said in satisfaction. “This is the last mention of the manuscripts in the library. She wrote her request in excellent French, in a clear hand: I bequeath the dowry we never used to Wystan and its inhabitants, the only ones who might find these words and appreciate our gift.”
Twenty-nine
While everyone else prepared for dinner, Gerard and Max descended into the chapel crypt.
“I can’t believe I’m desecrating a graveyard for books.” Max shone his lamp at the vaulted ceiling of the underground chamber. “Look at this! Someone knew how to build for eternity.”
“The same someone who didn’t appreciate his gifted wife? I think the women are telling us he was a bone-headed Ives.” Gerard had seen the dynamic between his mother and father long enough to know how it worked.
“A man needs to be single-minded if he’s to accomplish anything,” Max grumbled. “If this place was built four hundred years ago, the engineer was brilliant.”
Gerard ran his hand above the plates marking names and dates. Without Iona to help him focus, he only received mild vibrations that he translated as grief and loss, with the occasional sharper pangs of what might be greed or anticipation. He had no practice at actually defining different oscillations.
The fact that he thought in terms of oscillations and not spirits proved he was still his father’s son. “I’ll remind you that I’m not you. Only some of us are single-minded.”
Max snorted. “Fine then, the brute couldn’t read or write, so building was all he could do. Let me know when you find the right date.” Max might not be able to read the lettering, but he knew how to open a vault without bringing the ceiling down on their heads.
“If I’m remembering Roman numerals correctly, this is the oldest section.” Gerard indicated a plate with several names on it—all female if he knew anything of medieval French.
“All right then, let’s see where this goes.” Using chisel and hammer, Max pried at the crumbling seal. “If I see any ghosts, they’d better speak English.”
“If they mean to curse us for interrupting their rest, I’d rather it be in a language I don’t recognize.” Gerard tried not to expect too much.
The manuscripts had been left to the inhabitants of Wystan—currently, that would be his family.
The metal plate clattered to the stone floor. The crypt was so old that little more than a hint of must and dust emerged.
Max grimaced at the black hole. “The honors are yours.”
The lantern light barely reached the interior. Gerard wasn’t wearing his gloves. Preparing himself for a shock, he extended one hand into the opening.
Happiness. Contentment. Singing. Without Iona, he had no real vision. But as other artifacts had, a box spoke to him. He couldn’t hear the words, but he sensed relief and encouragement as he fumbled around among the caskets—until he encountered a square metal box that shouted Yes. Finding a handle, he drew it out, praying it wasn’t a child’s coffin.
“Do we open it here?” Tools in hand, Max studied what appeared to be a small, elaborately embossed brass casket. “I’d hate to take a pile of bones to the ladies.”
Gerard held the box in his palms and shook his head. “This is it. I feel Wystan on it. It’s very strange. I didn’t know Wystan had a feeling until now.”
“It’s called home, old boy.” Max slapped his back. “I knew it the moment I saw Lydia.”
For a man who thought only in terms of duty, who knew the law inside and out, Gerard was torn in two as he carried the box to the great hall. This business of allowing emotion to speak hampered logical decision making.
Just watching Iona sweep in, wearing one of her new dinner gowns, carrying her kitten, looking more like a countess than any beekeeper should, Gerard knew what she would say. It would be the same reaction as all the other ladies of Wystan—of his entire Malcolm family. His own mother would side with Iona.
But he was a practical Ives. The box held the answer to his dreams: a refurbished Wystan, income for travel, a cushion against disaster. Even his family should concede it was more important to protect the Wystan library and provide a home for the women who lived there and had nowhere else to go. He could send Aunt Winifred to her son—
They would never allow him to sell books.
After setting the kitten down to sniff delicately at the treasure, Iona caught his arm and studied the darkened casket. “You found it.”
She said it with confidence. Only she understood that he wouldn’t mistake bones for books. How could he disappoint a woman like that? How could he
